BONN (FIBA Europe Cup) - Telekom Baskets Bonn named Predrag Krunic as their new head coach just three days before the tip-off of the easyCredit BBL German league as planned coach Silvano Poropat was diagnosed with a serious long-term illness.

"We must assume that Silvano will miss numerous months," Bonn team president Wolfgang Wiedlich said on the club’s website announcing the move. "With the background of the medical diagnosis, it was necessary to act quickly and not go with a risky interim solution."

The club did not disclose with what illness the 45-year-old Poropat had been diagnosed. Wiedlich did say Bonn were not pre-warned at all, adding: "The things are what they are and just came out of nowhere."

Poropat was prepared to serve his first full season at Bonn after joining the club in March. The Croatian stepped down as Mitteldeutscher BC head coach on December 26, 2015, citing "inner emptiness" and "lethargy" after having served as the MBC leader since 2011 and in April 2015 extending his contract with MBC until 2020.

The 48-year-old Krunic, who received a contract until the end of the season, returns to Bonn 18 years after starting a seven-year coaching stint with the club, serving as head coach from 2001 to 2005. Krunic, who guided EWE Baskets Oldenburg to the 2009 German title, replaced Poropat at MBC last December and left the club after he failed to keep them in the German top flight.

Telekom Baskets Bonn have been drawn into FIBA Europe Cup Group C of Conference 1 along with Belgian side Belfius Mons Hainaut and the loser of the Basketball Champions League Qualification Round tie between Kataja of Finland and Sweden’s Sodertalje.

FIBA