GB U23’s Lose Heartbreaker To France

The GB U23’s  opened their tournament in Lille with a heartbreaking 71-70 loss to France. With possession and leading 70-69 with 17 seconds remaining, GB were called for a questionable inbound violation turning the ball back to France (edit-after reviewing the video, it was actually legit). Their starting point guard, crossed over Colin Sing at the top of the key before driving and finishing a tough drive in the lane with 4 seconds remaining.

Justin Robinson was unable to get a shot off before the final buzzer sounded, and the French celebrations ensued.

Matthew Bryan-Amaning led all scorers with 16 points, whilst Ashley Hamilton had a big double double with 14 points and 12 rebounds. Justin Robinson contributed 10 points and Adrien Sturt had 8.

GB will face their second game Saturday evening against Belgium.

Thoughts/Notes

-GB had some real struggles defensively, in particular not being able to keep the French off the offensive glass, leading to a number of second chance opportunities-France had 16 second chance points.

-In my opinion, this is a game GB should be kicking themselves for losing. It was there for the taking.

-Matthew Bryan-Amaning threw down a pretty ferocious dunk over two French defenders in the opening quarter, had a big reverse and a huge block off the glass..highlight reel.

-Some of the reffing was BS (most of which seemed to go against GB), glad to see that’s not just a problem in England

-I’m not sure whether it was due to foul trouble or not, but Finch used his bench a lot more than I expected him to.

-GB’s starters; Justin Robinson, Ogo Adegboye, Ben Eaves, Matthew Bryan-Amaning and Liam Potter

-Crowd was poor, venue has a capacity of 1800, I’d say there was between 50-100 in attendance. Hoping this increases over the weekend.

-Devan Bailey had 7, Ogo Adegboye 7, Ben Eaves 5 and Colin Sing and Andy Thompson 2 each.

-The game was tight throughout with 8 lead changes, GB’s biggest lead was 10.

-Ashley Hamilton impressed me the most, he shot an efficient 6/12 from the floor and rebounded well. When he chose to be aggressive, France pretty much couldn’t stop him.

-Finch got increasingly agitated at GB committing stupid fouls- there were a number of fouls committed (not the BS ones that existed only in the eyes of the ref) that were totally unnecessary.

-Looking forward to the game against Belgium, where I hope GB will come out with a chip on their shoulder.

-Luxembourg are easily the worst team in the tournament (I think they’re U20’s) and will should get blown out by both GB and France, after going down to Belgium 91-62 in the other day 1 matchup.