FIBA Europe has announced the seedings for the EuroBasket 2013 and the EuroBasket Women 2013 Qualification Rounds as well as the 2011 Youth European Championships 2012 Draw last week, with the draws taking place in a small city near Munich in a week time.
With the results of the EuroBasket 2011 campaign taken into account, the Cypriot men’s national team has been placed in the fifth seedings group alongside Belarus, Slovakia, Romania, Albania and Luxembourg.
Serbia, Turkey and Germany will be the top seeded nations together with Finland and Georgia who made it to the Second Round in Lithuania and Croatia who post the better coefficient among the teams which ended their campaign after the EuroBasket 2011 First Round.
“We will face opponents with history and deep seeded culture in basketball. The things will be very, very difficult for us. However, we will give our best to represent our country in the best possible way,” the national team captain Panayiotis Trisokkas assessed the new settings in the EuroBasket qualifications.
In total, 31 teams will battle for 16 places in the EuroBasket 2013 Final Round in Slovenia; they will be divided into five groups of five teams and one group of six teams. The first and the second placed teams in each group plus the four best third placed teams will qualify for the Final Round.
The Olympic Games and the Olympic Qualifying Tournament participants Spain, France, Russia, F.Y.R. of Macedonia, Lithuania, Greece, Slovenia and Great Britain are all qualified directly to the EuroBasket 2013 Final Round, while 10 tickets are still available for the EuroBasket Women 2013 Finals which are to be played in France.
The Cypriot women’s national team was not even enrolled for the qualifications, which is the best indication of how seriously they are taken by the local basketball federation, especially if we take into consideration that the national team of as small country as Luxembourg will be in the draw.
214 teams are expected to enter the Draw for the 14 Youth European Championships which are to take place across six age categories and three divisions next summer. The European Championships for Small Countries, formerly known as Division C, for men and women will take place in San Marino and F.Y.R. of Macedonia respectively. The exact dates of the youth competitions will be confirmed at the later stage.
