Disappointment for England, Future Stars 2010 Day 1 Mini Recap

It wasn’t a good day for English teams down in Kingston at Day 1 of the Future Stars international basketball tournament yesterday, as England U18’s and the Richmond Select team went a combined 0-4 in their games.

Richmond started the tournament facing up against Sweden, going down 87-63. Next it was England, who took on Poland and despite leading for large parts of the game, couldn’t maintain the lead and lost 77-68 (leading scorers (from gbbasketball.net); Josh Owen-Thomas and Louis Sayers with 13 points each, Devon Van Oostrum 11, Aaron Geramipoor 9). Their next game saw them take on Croatia, this time losing 73-58 (Geramipoor with 14, Van Oostrum 10). To complete the misery, the French side murdered Richmond 103-67.

England and Richmond both finished bottom of their groups and will now play it out against each other for 5th and 6th place over two legs (one today and one tomorrow).  Final group standings are as follows

Group A
1.Sweden
2.France
3.Richmond

Group B
1.Poland
2.Croatia
3.England

Sweden will play Croatia in the first semi final of the day today, followed by Poland vs France.

As you can see, not a good first day for English basketball! Stats will be going online later today, at which point I will edit this. For now, as always, a few…

Random Thoughts/Notes

• My opinion on England’s losses; I’m not a coach, nor do I claim to be, but when you have one of the best players in Europe on your team (Devon Van Oostrum) you think you’d be playing him 35 minutes a game. Devon played a ridiculously low amount of minutes (I’d estimate 20 a game) and totally changed the game when he was in.
• Talking of Devon, this was first time I got to see him play in person. He’s the real deal. In the minutes he did get, although he struggled shooting the ball missing shots you can see he’d normally make, everything is there for him to be the next great player out of the UK. The confidence, the athleticism, the VISION, the competitive nature. He is sick-expect to see a mix of him from these three days.
• Robert Gilchrist who, in my opinion, should be with the GB U20’s, is suiting up for Richmond. He showed what GB are missing out on, swatting at least 8 shots in Richmond’s first game of the day, and mixing it up both inside and out.
• In terms of highlights on day 1, nothing ridiculous. A few pretty nice dunks, a big putback from the French centre, and a reverse on the break from Devon. There was some very near-almost-posters including Richmond’s Kalil Irving almost getting CRAMMED on by a Swedish player (it ended up hitting the back of the rim). Expect a top 5 missed dunks mixtape ;)
• I predict it will be a France-Sweden final
• Attendance was decent at stages during the day, in part due to Future Star’s collaboration with the Luol Deng Foundation who bought along a fair few kids.
• Yesterday was a LONG day, ended up being the most games I’ve filmed in one day (6), starting at 10am and finishing at 10pm. You got no idea how relieved I am there’s only three games today and tomorrow!

Your Thoughts?

Did you make it down to Kingston? What did you think of Day 1? What are the big difference between the English sides and European? Would love to hear your thoughts; drop a comment below!