European Prospects

This year’s edition of the most prestigious U18 tournament in the world starts tomorrow (europeanprospects.com will cover it extensively, I will be present tomorrow, Monday, Friday and during the Final day), so that we went through the very latest news around the preparation of the participating teams.

• Turkey announced their final roster and it will not feature Enes Kanter (as expected) but also Berkay Candan won’t be in Mannheim. The team has some quality in the backcourt with Safak Edge and Can Korkmaz but in the paint, they need to build on the young Samet Geyik and project Ramazan Tekin. The full and final roster can be found here.
• The Italian team will come to Mannheim without their top prospect Alessandro Gentile who is neither in the 12-men roster nor in the reserve list. Italy will arrive in Mannheim only today Friday and play their opener on Saturday morning against New Zealand.
• The Junior Tall Blacks are improving since they arrived in Europe and their huge losses against Greece. In the first test against France, the Kiwis held the French team under 70 points which is the way to go according to their coach Deslea Wrathall: We achieved our first goal, which is keep a good international team under 70 points. We just snuck in there, so the boys played really well defensively. Now we’ve just got to learn to knock down more shots. We’re just missing too many open shots and easy layups. The offence is definitely working and we’re getting shots … it’s a matter of trusting their instincts to let the ball go. The guys need to get comfortable feeling uncomfortable. However, the second test against France was less concluding as they got destroyed 47-97 by falling away in the Final quarter 34-10 and 30 turnovers over the game.
• France looked apparently pretty impressive in this second test as reports DNA.fr. In front of 300 fans, the team around captain Evan Fournier showed its athletic potential and comes to Mannheim as one of the favorites. However, the two test games versus New Zealand are not of such a big value as France is playing certainly in the toughest elimination group with Argentina, USA and Croatia. Two of those teams won’t go to the Final round afterwards. The final French roster can be found here.
• Germany U18 comes to the tournament with a major confidence boost after an overtime victory against the USA. After some intensive practice sessions in the morning, Kay Blümel’s team overcame the United States in front of 450 spectators behind the impressive Philipp Neumann who initiated the decisive run in OT with 5 points. With this win, Germany underlines their status of semi-final candidate once again.
• The Brazilian U18 team under head coach Walter Roese has embarked for Germany yesterday. Their final roster and program can be found here.
• The same goes for the Odesur Games Gold medal winners of Argentina who come with the goal to reach the highest level as possible. The final roster can be found here.
• Japan had its only preparation against Australia yesterday and here is the final roster for the Japanese squad.