By Eurohoops team/ info@eurohoops.net
In an interview for the website of the Finnish Basketball Federation, national team’s head coach Henrik Dettman unleashed an attack against EuroLeague.
Here’s what Dettman said (per FIBA):
On EuroLeague’s positions:
“It’s absurd that EuroLeague released a statement claiming they are worried about how much the players have to travel in the national team windows. Back in 2016, EuroLeague decided to nearly double their own regular season game totals.”
“While EuroLeague has the grand ambition to form an ‘NBA of Europe’, factually the league has only been shrinking throughout the years. EuroLeague is run by a handful of elite clubs and for the rest, their business is highly unprofitable. Meanwhile, the millionaire moguls running the show in the EuroLeague are only interested in the individual success of the clubs.”
“EuroLeague follows business logic and business logic only. It presents a grave danger for not only European basketball, but the whole of institutionalized sport as well. We’re talking about something much bigger than just a couple of qualifiers games here and there. We’re talking about referee education, junior player development, the basic everyday operations of basketball clubs.”
“First they take basketball, then they move on to the next one. The next one in line might be soccer since soccer is much a bigger industry than basketball in Europe.”
On EuroLeague and the NBA:
“The comparison to the NBA and NCAA is also beyond my understanding. The NBA and NCAA operate on a whole different continent and in completely different conditions than EuroLeague. These two American leagues and the EuroLeague can’t be compared.”
On the EuroLeague, the World Cup Qualifiers, and national teams:
“What makes this interesting is that Jorge Garbajosa of Spanish Basketball Federation has been told to invite all the EuroLeague players to the FIBA World Cup qualifiers since it would be against the Spanish law if the players were not to participate in national team duties,” he said. “We’ll see what happens in this case.”
“The whole idea of national team sports is based on payback principle. When a player represents his home country, they reach out to their country and basketball community – the whole extended family behind them. Players represent their national teams when they identify their roots, want to give back and share the common good.
“During my 25 years as a national team head coach, I have seen time and time again how important the national team is to all the players and how sincerely they want to play in front of the people who have been behind them as well as the next generations.
“People running the EuroLeague do not recognize the relationship between players and national teams. When they suggested how the whole national team activities should be organized in July – Olympic Games, too – it said everything about them and the principles they follow.”