GB home double header moved to France for next FIBA qualifying window

The Great Britain Senior men’s two home games in the upcoming November windows of the FIBA EuroBasket 2022 Qualifiers have been moved to Pau, France, following amendments to the locations due to COVID-19.

The FIBA Europe Board approved the move to host qualification games in a protected environment tournament format – informally known as ‘bubbles’ – in its 10th meeting, held via videoconference on Thursday.

The loss of the home games – against France and Montenegro – will be a blow to fans who miss out on not one (as in the last window) but two opportunities to see the squad in action, however, the players are less phased by the change in location:

“It’s going to be a great opportunity,” Gabe Olaseni told Hoopsfix last week on the podcast.

“We’ve got a long list of guys who can make the team, I’m sure the coaching staff will put the guys together who they think will gel best in that window. I think we’re in a great position to get two wins, especially with the guys we’ve had over the years, everyone’s been playing well in whatever league their in right now.

“We’ve got a group of guys that don’t really care where they play. We could be in Newcastle – which was a great environment – or we could be in Turkey playing in front of 20,000 people. We just want to be out there and represent, I think regardless of where we are, under whichever conditions we’re going to go out and play hard.”

The playing schedule is still to be confirmed, with GB originally scheduled to play France on November 26 and Montenegro on November 29, meanwhile the location of their scheduled away games – also being moved to the bubble format – on February 19 and 22 against Germany and France, respectively – remain to be confirmed.

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