Men's Basketball

Luol Deng of the NBA side Chicago Bulls and was an ambassador for the London 2012 Olympic Games bid. The succesful bid was the catalyst for the formation of the Great Britain national basketball team, with the ambition of winning a medal at the 2012 Olympic Games.

Qualification

The Beijing 2008 competition is a twelve team tournament with the following teams qualifying:

• China - Host nation
• Spain -2006 FIBA World Championship Winner (Japan , Aug 19 - Sep 3, 2006)
• Winners - 2007 FIBA Africa Championship (Angola, August 2007)
• Winners - 2007 FIBA Asia Championship (Japan , July 19-29, 2007)
• Top 3 teams - 2007 FIBA Americas Championship (Las Vegas, Aug 22 - Sep 2, 2007)
• Top 2 teams - 2007 FIBA Europe Championship (Spain, September 3-16, 2007)
• Winners - 2007 FIBA Oceania Championship (September 2007)
• Top 3 teams - World Olympic Qualifying Tournament (July 6-13, 2008)

Form

The Great Britain national basketball team cannot qualify for Beijing due to their low ranking in the European system. The team is competing in Division B Group B of the 2007 Eurobasket that forms part of the qualifying process for future events and need to win the Group to have a chance of progressing to the next level. At the half-way point they have two wins from four games. In October 2006, Deng became a naturalized British citizen and is now available to play for the reamaining qualifying games.

What to watch

As there will be no British interest, we will try to get tickets for the preliminary rounds.