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20 November, 2017
26 February, 2019
28/08/2018
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Against all odds, war-torn Syria succeeds in "Keeping Basketball Alive"

DAMASCUS (FIBA Basketball World Cup 2019 Asian Qualifiers) – Despite being at war for the last seven years, Syria has regularly participated in continental competitions between 2011 and 2018.

Last month, when Syria progressed to the second round of the World Cup 2019 Asian Qualifiers, it signified a monumental achievement.

“Syria’s national team has been successful mainly because of the effective short-term plans drawn by the Federation. We had a clear target in mind, qualifying for FIBA Asia Cup 2017 via the WABA tournament, hiring an experienced foreign head coach, naturalizing a good player and advancing to the second round of the FIBA Basketball World Cup 2019 Asian Qualifiers,” Syrian Basketball Federation (SBF) Secretary General Dr. Daniel Al Kefel told FIBA.com.

 

Keeping Basketball Alive

Syria has been a country at war since 2011, but the SBF had set a vision of “Keeping Basketball Alive”, no matter the odds.

"I’m proud to say that basketball activities didn’t stop during the war. The sport survived and for that I have to thank our passionate fans, the families of the players and the clubs who along with the National Federation worked hand in hand in keeping our beloved sport alive!" Dr Kefel said.

The SBF has been on a mission to grow the sport horizontally. In doing so, Local Syrian teams have steadily increased their participation from 271 games (across 4 categories in 6 competitions) in 2012 to 735 games (across 7 categories in 11 competitions) in 2018.

Having progressed to the second round of the ongoing World Cup Qualifiers, Syria is now among the top 10 teams in Asia (and top 12 if you include Australia and New Zealand). This growth is especially impressive considering the adverse circumstances in which it was achieved.

The graph shows the increase in number of basketball competitions in Syria from 2012-2018

“It has been tough seven years for Syria. The war affected everything including basketball. Our main challenge was to keep the sport alive during these years. We didn’t want basketball to die [because of the war], because bringing it back to life was going to be very hard and maybe impossible," said Dr Kefel, elaborating on the trying circumstances that the SBF had to face.

What's Next?

Syria has huge potential to develop basketball thanks to the admirable efforts of SBF stakeholders in sustaining its activities during the war.

Now that the situation is more stable, Syria seems poised to develop its basketball structure rapidly, in collaboration with various departments of FIBA.

“ Now that the situation is stable, the Federation will be focusing on achieving key objectives such as playing at home in front of our fans, conducting administrative workshops for our staff, improving the technical and physical abilities of our players focusing on age categories and women’s basketball and developing grassroots basketball,” Dr Kefel said.

The goal now is to set a comprehensive technical development strategy and rebuild Syria's basketball infrastructure. Simultaneously, it is hoped that basketball will provide an opportunity for social cohesion, highly needed in a period where unity is at stake, and for healing and moving forward.

 FIBA