The pillar of the French team after being eliminated early at the FIBA World Cup: "Disgraceful and dare not return home"
The French team entered the FIBA World Cup 2023 finals with 5th place on the world rankings, the owner of the Tokyo Olympic silver medal 2 years ago and won the bronze medal at the 2019 World Cup.
These achievements put Rudy Gobert and his teammates in the competition for the championship, or else the team that could take home a medal from the "Basketball World Cup" before hosting the Summer Olympics next year.
However, the French team was eliminated early after a surprise defeat against Latvia despite leading by 13 points. In addition to the salt defeat against Canada on the opening day, the French team was officially eliminated from the group stage.
Many French players are extremely disappointed with this result in a tournament where they set very high goals. With the bigman playing for the LA Clippers, Nicolas Batum, he feels ashamed and afraid to go home to face the fans.
“I have never in my life felt ashamed to play for the national team, but this time I am really ashamed. I am even afraid to return home because we have let so many fans down at the 2023 FIBA World Cup," Batum said.
“I know this year a lot of people expect us to do something special. Personally, I also believe that I can go further and get my hands on the trophy. But not only did we not reach our goal, we were shamefully eliminated.
I really don't know what state I will have to return to the country," added the bigman of the French team.
For many years, France is the national basketball team with very high stability in international tournaments. No team has just won medals at the 2019 World Cup and the 2021 Olympics other than France.
They have just won a silver medal at the 2022 European Championship (EuroBasket), come very close to usurping the US team at the final at the Tokyo Olympics 2021 and once brought home a bronze medal at the FIBA World Cup 2019.
Knowing that the French team lacks a number of pillars compared to the EuroBasket 2022 squad, notably defender Thomas Heurtel is currently banned from the national team due to signing a contract with a Russian club.
But France's current squad is not weak with Nicolas Batum, scorer Evan Fournier, bigman Guerschon Yabusele, defender Nando de Colo or the brightest star is Rudy Gobert, All-Star striker with 3 Defensive Player of 3 titles. The Year.
The nightmare of the French team began with the opening match against Canada, where they lost face salt with an unbelievable difference of up to 30 points. It seemed that the match against Latvia would be a good mental medicine when Fournier and his teammates took the initiative.
Then everything reversed quickly when the French fell in the 4th half, losing their 13-point lead and losing to a Latvian team that was still missing the No. 1 star, Kristaps Porzingis.
With two defeats in the two group stage matches, France's last match against Lebanon is now just procedural because they are no longer able to progress.
“We are a strong team with a proven track record over the years. But this result shows that when the team is not cohesive, mentally weak and in bad shape, failure can always happen," Nicolas Batum shared.
“Every member of the team needs to look to this summer for lessons, from the players, staff members and the elite. To achieve a common goal, we all have to be on the same page, which is something we didn't have this summer."
This result will put great pressure on the French basketball team in the near future, especially when they will be the host of the 2024 Summer Olympics. One more defeat at home will cause the whole team to be criticized. quote even more.
