By Aris Barkas/ barkas@eurohoops.net
The situation in the training camp of Russia seems to be out of control and Kirilenko may be the man to solve it, at least in the future, as the new president of the Russian basketball federation.
One day after the announcement about Anton Ponkrashov (the team captain), Evgeny Voronov and Yegor Vyaltsev being cut from the team for medical reasons. However, according to many reports, the rest of the national team players threatened to boycott the Eurobasket and the agents of the three players denied any serious injury. So the trio is back with the federation insisting that they have medical issues, but during the last 24 hours they demanded to play through injuries.
Meanwhile in Ekaterinburg, Andrei Kirilenko, the only candidate so far for the upcoming elections in the Russian basketball federation on the 25th of August – after the mess that the previous regime caused which may have costed the Eurobasket participation of Russia – was asked about the issue. As he said – courtesy of Russian journalist Alexander Chernykh – “I am very disappointed. How is it possible that a player gets cut via a team administrator (ed.note: the team doctor informed the three players of being cut via phone). Why wouldn’t a coach invite them, for a talk, even if it is to part ways. Still this is not a situation in which a federation president should intervene. If you hire a coach, you trust him 100% and stay out of the way. But nevertheless, the current situation dissapoints me”.
With his slogan being “defend” and his election almost certain, it will be interesting to see the biggest modern basketball icon of Russia defending the sports in his country.