Basketball becomes bat-sketball as player swats Halloween night invader

It was with an uncanny sense of timing that a bat chose Halloween to disrupt the NBA tie between San Antonio Spurs and the Sacramento Kings. What, perhaps, the creature did not count on were the quick hands of the Spurs' Manu Ginobili who, not content with scoring 13 points in his side's 113-94 win, swatted it from the air as it swooped across the court.

The bat had already sent players to the sidelines twice in the first quarter. The officials stopped the game as it circled then flew across the AT&T Center's court. First they called for a towel to catch it, then a net. But Ginobili took matters, literally, into his own hands. When the bat returned he simply smacked it to the ground before calmly carrying it off court to thunderous applause.

After a brief squirt of disinfectant from a trainer, and with the theme from Batman ringing in his ears over the venue's PA, the Argentinian player carried on much as if nothing had happened. "When you can't dunk anymore, you have to find a way to make it into the news," he said afterwards. "So that's what I did. I grabbed a bat. I didn't think it was a big deal. Then the whole arena started chanting my name."

It was his team-mate, Tony Parker, who led the Spurs' victory with 24 points and seven assists, however it was Ginobili's bat-slapping exploits that grabbed the attention. "That was amazing," said Parker. "The legend continues with Manu. Unbelievable. He's always doing crazy stuff."

It was something his coach, Gregg Popovich confirmed: "The drummer that he marches to sometimes is a little bit different. He never ceases to amaze me and he just did it again. The legend grows. It's incredible on Halloween night. You would call someone a liar if they told you that story."

"I guess in Argentina, bat hunting is part of everyday life," the Kings centre Spencer Hawes said. "Somebody had to do it, and it wasn't going to be me."