UcanUwill wrote:France always had talent, but you can't deny that they got more talented in this decade. France players often were run and gun, athleticism over strategy type of players. If you live by this style of play, you really need individually strong players to beat top European nations. And France has those players now, their talent caught on to their style of play. Batum is a big upgrade on the wing, Ajinca and Gobert upgraded center postition, they got deeper with guys like Huertel, Lauvergne, Fournier coming of the bench. France reached elite level.
And yes, if you tier teams, and do it with precision, France and Spain are still above Greece and Serbia. Don't get me wrong, Greece and Serbia can easily beat Spain or France, but if I have to tier them, I still put them slightly below those teams.
I seem to remember that the last time Greece played against Spain and France they beat them both. Or am I wrong? I seem to remember actually that Greece almost always beats France for many years now, and only loses to them when they have all their stars missing. Or am I wrong?
I seem to remember that Serbia beat France last time they played. And also that Serbia has been one of the biggest thorns in the side of Spain in recent years also. Am I wrong here?
In case of France, they have a horrible match up against Greece. Because their style of basketball really does not work against a team like Greece at all. They also have a poor match up against a team like Serbia, although not quite as bad as against Greece, because Serbia does not have as many shooters and scorers as Greece does when they have more of their better players. But the point is that, the style of play and type of team of France is not good for matching with teams like Serbia and Greece.
With Spain, I guess you could count them better with Serbia, because Serbia is still not as deep as them and still Serbia is lacking in some real quality players here and there and they don't have the same experience level. But I have to ask though, how long do we just say Spain is at the top here when all their leaders except Marc Gasol are ancient players? I mean, they seem like new Argentina now, where no matter what age they are, every tournament everyone just swears they will win gold because of past glories and it matters nothing that most of their leaders are years and years past their primes, or even almost former players, and in some cases should have retired years ago already.
Argentina was like that. For years and tournament after tournament, people just guaranteed they would be winning medals at World Cups and Olympics even though they were ancient and all their key players were years past their good playing years. You could not reason with the logic of people that thought this though if you said they were too old. But never did Argentina win a thing once they got to that point, yet people kept saying endlessly they would for years.
I feel exactly this is how Spain seems now. Last summer how shocked all people were how can they not win gold medal? Well maybe because their leaders of their team are really old? Maybe because they are too old? Now all everyone guarantees they must win gold or silver now it seems. It just reminds exactly of all those years people talking about that old has been Argentina team to me.
Pau Gasol = 35
Felipe Reyes = 35
Juan Carlos Navarro = 35
So Spain is probably I would guess going to be something like,
if it is Ibaka,
PG Sergio Rodriguez / Sergio Llull / Pau Ribas
SG Juan Carlos Navarro /
SF Rudy Fernandez / Fernando San Emeterio
PF Pau Gasol / Felipe Reyes / Victor Claver
C Marc Gasol / Serge Ibaka
if it is Mirotic,
PG Sergio Rodriguez / Sergio Llull / Pau Ribas
SG Juan Carlos Navarro /
SF Rudy Fernandez / Fernando San Emeterio
PF Pau Gasol / Nikola Mirotic / Victor Claver
C Marc Gasol / Felipe Reyes
with I'm guessing someone like Xavi Rabaseda or Alex Abrines probably at SG.
Break that down piece by piece. I see a roster of old and over the hill guys (Pau, Reyes, Navarro), some guys that have injury issues (Ibaka if he plays, Rudy that is injury prone), some very talented players that have so far in their careers proven that they are very talented, and that they fold like a deck of cards against pressure (Rodriguez, Llull, Ribas, Rabaseda, Abrines, Mirotic, Claver), role player veteran (San Emeterio)...
And then in case of Marc Gasol, in modern basketball in FIBA, if a team wants to, they can take him out of a game with their defensive scheme if they choose to do so. Especially if they have a big front line. Big behemoth centers like him can be neutralized with FIBA rules by a great defensive scheme and a big front line in today's game.
And so they lack that one perimeter scorer with the ball. Who is it? Are they going to rely on 35 year old Pau to handle things then? or 35 year old Navarro to handle things then? You know that is what they have always done since forever. These guys are 35 years old now. This is same discussion I swear as in past years as Argentina, where some people just would not accept that they got too old and their time was past.
OK, maybe you can put them over Serbia I guess because they are deeper than Serbia and as I said Serbia still lacks in some quality players in certain places in their roster definitely. And the experience factor. Maybe over Croatia because some of Croatia key players are really young and that team is super inconsistent with such young players as that.
I really don't see how Spain is better than Greece though. I mean how? How? They will be relying on Rudy to create a ton of offense on the perimeter, on guys like Llull and Rodriguez to take a lot of shots. They will be trying to force feed Marc Gasol a lot through harsh FIBA zone stacked defense against two 6-10 to 7-0 guys in the paint. And if that does not work, then back to 35 year old Pau, Navarro and hope Reyes can crash the boards still at 35? Hope Ibaka's knee is fine?
I see a full Greek team looking much better than that Spain team. I don't see it. France and Greece looks clearly better than Spain by any clear and objective analysis. I can only see how people saying Spain is in top 2 teams are again playing this same card as like Argentina in the past, and not wanting to admit that their time was past it. Spain has more players coming along and helping than Argentina did, but still their team was Pau and Navarro and greatly helped by Reyes crashing the offensive boards, and those guys are really not going to hold up any more in these kinds of tournaments.
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Israel announced 19 men preliminary squad. Definition of middle of the pack team, far from the top teams, but far from the worst. Could shock B group team in the play offs if lucky.
Poland's 16 men preliminary :
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