[Global Times Comprehensive Report] The Chinese men’s basketball team ushered in the first game of the Asian Cup in Jakarta on the evening of the 12th. In the contest with the old rival South Korea, the Chinese men's basketball team lost to the South Korean men's basketball team 81:93 and failed to get a good start. In another match in the same group that day, Chinese Taipei team 102 defeated Bahrain team 84: 84.
In this game, when Zhou Qi and Wang Zhelin were unable to play, the Chinese men's basketball coach Du Feng used a small lineup at the beginning, and the team relied on breakthroughs and long-range shots to attack the opponent. Throughout the game, Gu Quan and Zhao Rui both scored 22 points, and naturalized player Luo Jianer in the Korean men's basketball team scored 25 points.
Although the Asian Cup has been decoupled from the World Cup and Olympic qualifications, the Chinese men's basketball team still attaches great importance to this event. However, the Chinese men's basketball team's preparations were affected by the COVID-19 epidemic. During the team's World Cup preliminaries in Melbourne, Australia, many players tested positive for nucleic acid and . In order to ensure that the Asian Cup competition can proceed normally, the Chinese men's basketball team urgently recruited five players from China: Zhai Xiaochuan, Fan Ziming, He Xining, Jiang Weize and Gao Shiyan to fly to Jakarta. In the 12-man Asian Cup roster announced by the Chinese men's basketball team on the 10th, Zhao Rui, Xu Jie, Hu Mingxuan, Sun Minghui, Jiang Weize, Zhou Qi, Wang Zhelin, Fan Ziming, Zhai Xiaochuan, Gu Quan, He Xining and Fu Hao is listed.
In this list, Guo Ailun , Zhao Jiwei , Shen Zijie and Zhu Junlong , the four players who participated in the world preliminaries, are not included, and Gao Shiyan, one of the recruited players, was also not selected. Guo Ailun said through his personal social platform on the evening of the 12th that he regretted not being able to participate in the Asian Cup. "I still have a cough and chest pain, and it has not turned negative yet."
The Chinese team and the South Korean team are the two seed teams in Group B. The two teams have won a total of 44 Asian Cup medals including 18 gold medals (16 for the Chinese team). FIBA official website said that the encounter between the Chinese and Korean men's basketball teams was a heavyweight dialogue. The South Korean men's basketball team is the first team to announce a 12-man roster for this tournament. Among them, the top scorer and rebounder of the South Korean team in the 2019 World Cup and the naturalized player Na Jianer set foot on the Asian Cup for the first time.
After the confrontation with the South Korean team, the Chinese men's basketball team will face the Bahrain team on the 14th and the last opponent in the group, the Chinese Taipei team, on the 16th. The first place in the group will directly advance to the quarterfinals, and the second and third place in the group will participate in the quarterfinals play-offs. (Li Jiayin)
Source: Global Times
