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Germany, Lebanon, Lithuania, and Russia received wildcards to fill out tournament.

Dominican Republic would deserve to go IMO, but hey, FIBA decided that to be a Wild Card you had to be able to pay between 700,000 and 1,000,000 dollars....
I will never understand or agree with FIBA, why not just let all the teams qualify with their level of play?
Greed and sport should never be associated like that.

On a side note I think the 4 teams that were chosen are very good. It's just the way FIBA selected them that annoys me.

I dont know why Lebanon was chosen.. They will be down 40 against every decent team

FIBA is talking about getting rid of the wildcard system and adding an additional qualifying tournament. It shouldn't be this way, hopefully, for 2014.

Yeah, Lebanon has no right to be there.

Considering their biggest players were Pops and Archibald, UK did good in this EuroBasket. If they can get one of either Gordon or Deng to play then they should've been invited.

AdamTheGreek wrote:Yeah, Lebanon has no right to be there.

Considering their biggest players were Pops and Archibald, UK did good in this EuroBasket. If they can get one of either Gordon or Deng to play then they should've been invited.

But you can only have three per zone. Great Britain would have had to take either Germany, Lithuania, or Russia's spot in order to qualify. I don't think they deserve it over any of those teams considering their history and lack of success. I would go as far as to say that they don't deserve it over Lebanon either.

From a basketball perspective the DR should have been awarded the non Europe wild card. They had the best chance at being competitive.

Also, from a purely basketball perspective I think it hurts Isreal to be considered a European team instead of Asia zone qualifier. If they didn't compete against European national teams Isreal would almost certainly be at the World Championships and Olympics every time around.

PopularByDemand wrote:FIBA is talking about getting rid of the wildcard system and adding an additional qualifying tournament. It shouldn't be this way, hopefully, for 2014.

They want 32 teams in 2014 so there would be no reason for any wild card.

^^^ I'm hoping they add 32 teams AND an additional qualifying tournament, so we don't have to worry about wildcards anymore. However, I don't think FIBA will make two drastic changes within one year. It's either 32 teams OR an additional qualifying tournament. I think the latter is unlikely since there would most likely be scheduling conflicts. If they move all the regional tournaments up a month, then maybe it could happen. But of course, that would be another change FIBA would have to make and I don't see them doing that.