WROCŁAW, Poland — Lithuania have scraped through pool play to make it to the next round of EuroBasket ‘09, with a scratchy 84-69 victory over the winless Bulgaria.

It was anything but a polished performance from the Lithuanians who will need a much better showing if they are to dispose of Slovenia, the surprise winners of group C when they meet them on Saturday night.

Again the Lithuanians did not seem to gel together early on, with any real fluency lacking. Early on the Lithuanians lead by as much as seven points, only for poor passing and attacking options to slip into their game, letting the Bulgarians back into the match.

At stages in the second-quarter, they even briefly relinquished their lead and Lithuanian coach Ramūnas Butautas would undoubtedly have been unhappy going into the half-time break with scores tied at 41.

The Lithuanians were slow out of the blocks in the second-half as Bulgaria quickly developed a six-point lead, a lead they held onto up until  just 18 seconds remained in the quarter when a Tomas Delininkaitis lay-up put Lithuania back in front (57-56). It was a lead that they did not give up again, with the Lithuanians finally managing to string some plays together to easily take the fourth-quarter 25-13.

If coach Butautas was too concerned afterwards, he did not seem it when talking to eurobasket2009.org. He said that there was much pressure on his players before the game and he was happy with how they withstood it.

He is now confident that the team can do much better in the second round to progress further. Kšištof Lavrinovič top-scored for Lithuania with 16, while Marijonas Petravičius had a busy night at both ends of the court, scoring 13 points and pulling down 8 rebounds.