RSS
@
Twitter
Facebook
Great Britain Men’s Team’s campaign in the upcoming EuroBasket could suffer a major blow after an NBA lockout was imposed, putting Luol Deng and Ben Gordon’s stint with the team in serious jeopardy.
Already hit by an injury to former NBA player Pops Mensah-Bonsu, Deng and Gordon could be forced to forego their stint if Great Britain will fail to release 1 million Euro as injury insurance in case one or both of them absorb a career-ending injury while playing for the national team.
The injury insurance issue will not just be felt by the Great Britain team but also by the other teams worldwide, who will be playing with a player that needs to be insured first before suiting up for their national teams.
Asked about the potential blow to their campaign, British Basketball performance director Chris Spice said that they will be doing anything to secure the services of Deng and Gordon and also added that FIBA, basketball’s world-governing body, is also looking for a solution to solve the problems of the involved national teams.
“We’re trying to secure insurance coverage,” Spice said. “FIBA Europe has also looked into it on behalf of all the nations who have NBA players. We’ve look at their coverage as well as taking one out independently. The issue is that we have two players. The thing now is that we’re taking to insurers about what the conditions would be to bring the premiums down.”
Deng and Gordon would absolutely be a huge boost for Great Britain, who were drawn in Group A where they will collide with Poland, Turkey, Lithuania, Spain, and another qualifier in the preliminary round that starts on August 31 in Lithuania.
Buzz