“We Are Not Playing WWE”: Exum Lashes Out

Australian basketball star Dante Exum has broken his silence about the ugly brawl that saw him grabbed across the neck and slammed to the ground.

Two weeks ago, in the dying stages of Game 2 of the EuroLeague quarterfinals, an ugly all-in brawl broke out between Exum’s Partizan and Real Madrid.

Former Boston Celtic Guerschon Yabusele delivered a body slam style move to Exum, which forced the Aussie star to leave the stadium on crutches.

After Madrid won the series 3-2 on Thursday, Exum lashed out about the incident, criticising how Madrid and Yabusele apologised in statements, but never directly to him.

“I think it’s funny how they (Madrid) controlled the narrative and story,” Exum told Basketnews.com.

“They came out in the media with all the apologies. I didn’t get one apology straight from Yabusele. It just shows how they are.

“I think I even would have felt a little bit better about the situation if he even tried to apologise or do anything. But they did it through the media.”

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">HUGE BRAWL just went down in Wizink Center between Partizan and Real Madrid players ? <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/EuroLeague?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#EuroLeague</a> <a href="https://t.co/wkpzyIQTcM">pic.twitter.com/wkpzyIQTcM</a></p>&mdash; BasketNews (@BasketNews_com) <a href="https://twitter.com/BasketNews_com/status/1651690275016699908?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 27, 2023</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Yabusele was suspended for five games for the incident, a soft sanction according to Exum.

“I think everyone that plays basketball and saw the film knows that the punishment wasn’t tough enough,” Exum said.

“I think everyone is shocked. We are not playing WWE.

“I guess EuroLeague sucked it up and gave them light suspensions.”