Sasha Djordjevic: “National team success grows if you have the best players on court”

By Eurohoops team/ info@eurohoops.net

Serbian National Team and Bayern Munich head coach Sasha Djordjevic talked to Radio Marca in a conversation where, among other things, he gave his opinion about the FIBA “Windows”.

When asked about his opinion, on the subject, Djordjevic gave a quite lengthy answer:

It is a very complex subject and very difficult to discuss in 5-10 minutes. Everything comes from your president, Jorge Garbajosa, who had an injury when he was playing with Toronto and also wanted to play for Spain. That was big dedication because he wanted to defend his country (in 2008). Then he had problems and the franchise decided to release him during the summer. They wanted to have their players in their club, in the NBA.

The profits and exposure of the NBA happen because they understood that with healthy players the interest grows. They vetoed FIBA in negotiations. The players weren’t going because they had an ingrown nail, for example. Because sometimes the excuses are ridiculous, others are true. FIBA understood that they had a problem and they had to solve it.

The NBA sets the conditions and pushes the FIBA to take the EuroLeague competition into its competitions. There were problems and they (FIBA) sought to create a parallel league, the Champions League. This (the conflict) hurts all clubs and teams. The teams are hurt because, somehow, FIBA begins a Cold War with which they put “a sword on the neck” of the competition that belongs to the clubs: the EuroLeague.

We want the best players to wear the jersey of the national team to increase the popularity of basketball through the national team. The successes of the national teams grow if you have the best ones on the field. We, as coaches -me, Sergio (Scariolo) and other colleagues- we can’t count on the best (players) because they play either in the NBA or EuroLeague and we have people with a lot of heart and pride but who are not the best. They express their love to their homeland but the game is not always the best.

In my opinion, it has to be the best basketball a country can produce. There are objective difficulties that we find in our path and we suffer. It is not fair to the delivery we have made throughout our history as players, coaches, media, fans. You have to think very well and open your mind.

My personal opinion is that the ball is in the hands of the presidents of the federations. Presidents should sit down and find a solution, as a whole. The great former players like Andrei Kirilenko (Russia), Jose Garbajosa (Spain), Sasha Danilovic (Serbia), Stojan Vrankovic (Croatia), Rasho Nesterovic (Slovenia), Hedo Turkoglu (Turkey), should sit together. That’s what we (Federations) want and it has to be that way. If you (FIBA) do not want those calendars if you do not want us to play in that period, then we strike”.

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