CBA to push reform, nurture younger players

English>>Sports

Editor's Pick

CBA to push reform, nurture younger players

By Sun Xiaochen (Chinadaily.com.cn) 10:02, August 24, 2013

Email|Print|Comments

twitter

facebook

Sina Microblog

The Chinese Basketball Association said it will push professional reform of the CBA league while strengthening its cultivation of youth players, at a media briefing on Friday after reviewing the national team's humiliating FIBA Asian Championship campaign.

"The team's poor performance deeply hurt the hearts of our fans and the association takes full responsibility for the defeat," CBA chief Xin Lancheng told a packed meeting room at the association headquarters in Beijing.

Team China finished the biennial Asian tournament at fifth in its worst result since 1975, and lost a direct berth at next year's FIBA World Cup (formerly the World Championship) earlier this month.

According to an official statement released after the briefing, CBA attributed the defeat to some profound causes including the game's shrinking talent pool and the CBA league's lack of professional development.

"We should further work on building young talent by offering young players more opportunities on the world stage without caring too much about the results," said the statement. "Meanwhile, technical support and prizes should be given to grassroots coaches for contributions to nursing young players."

However, the reality is far from the promise.

A roster reshuffle of the national team, which was supposed to take place after the last Asian Championship in 2011, has been postponed twice — at the London Olympics and the Manila tournament — due to the governing body favoring veterans.

Promising young guns like center Wang Zhelin and Li Muhao were cut before the London Games and lost the chance to hone their skills on a larger stage.

At league level, clubs tend to use their foreign players more instead of offering local youngsters decent minutes on court, after spending huge amounts to lure the foreign stars.

Pundits urged the association to issue policies on limiting foreigners' playing time but Xin said the current foreign policy, which allows each team to sign two foreigners and an additional Asian player for bottom-five clubs won't be changed.