MELBOURNE (Paulo Kennedy's View from Downunder) - I'm going to call this straight - the criticism of the Opals' team selection for the Rio Olympics has missed the point, just as I and many others did about the roster for the last FIBA Women's World Championship in Turkey.

News Limited scribe Boti Nagy wrote that the "12 players named by Basketball Australia today for matches in Japan later this week are another in a long line of interesting combinations dating back to last year's Oceania Series".

He added that "surely it is time to be pruning to get closer to the actual 12 who will represent Australia at the Worlds" and "it seems as if it is becoming an almost never-ending search to find the players who will fill spots 9-12 when the focus should squarely be on 1-8".

I'm sure many people nodded their heads in agreement, I know I was certainly scratching mine about what direction the team was heading. Turns out I was wrong. Spectacularly wrong.

Of the 12-woman squad that went to Japan, nine of them were selected for Turkey 2014. One, Elizabeth Cambage, missed the World Championship with injury, but even after losing a player of that stature, Joyce's hand-picked Opals produced a tournament for the ages.

What Joyce had envisaged, his players produced. Their ball movement was superb and their defence like five players on a rope, with only the USA reaching 60 points against them.

Going 5-1, the Opals' average winning margin was 29.8 - the USA's was 28.8 even with a 75-point rout of Angola - winning easily against teams like Canada, Turkey and Cuba who were more than competitive with other quality sides in the tournament.

Even the Aussies' one loss was a quality effort, trailing the USA by nine at three-quarter-time before falling by 12 in what was one of the Opals best ever performances against the Americans.

So despite my strong reservations, I have to admit the team Joyce picked was right and the style he implemented was too. Those reservations revolved mostly around the selection of Natalie Burton and Tessa Lavey, who seemed like picks from way too far out in left field. Once again though, I was wrong.

Burton was our equal-leading rebounder with Marianna Tolo, including leading the side in boards during the medal rounds. She also played some quality D at the four-spot, teaming with Laura Hodges to help make the Opals' pick-and-roll defence extremely hard to crack.

In limited minutes Lavey showed what a strong on-ball defender she is, justifying her pick as the baby of the team and an investment in the future, one that continues to pay off with her improved form.

Burton was our second-leading rebounder in last year's Oceania series against New Zealand, also ranking number two in possessions gained (offensive rebounds + steals - turnovers). Who was number one in both those categories? Lavey.

If you want to play disruptive defence you need guards who can defend full-court, and Lavey fits that description.

You also need bigs who can attack ball-screens defensively but are quick enough to recover before their teammates are forced into rotations or their opponents get easy o-boards. Burton does that.

So there is little doubt both Lavey and Burton were correct selections in 2014 and 2015, but after the Opals squad for Rio was announced this week, the question became whether Burton is the right pick for 2016.

While those outside Australia must find it odd that the Opals' leading rebounder from the last World Championship is considered a controversial selection, the point of contention is that Burton - who does not produce big numbers in the WNBL - was chosen ahead of Suzy Batkovic, who has won four of the past five WNBL MVP awards.

If you then perform well in a major tournament you get invited to the next year's camp, irrespective of what you have done at the lower level in between. Simple.

And yet while the commentary around Burton has been disappointing in that regard, in another way it has missed the point altogether. Whether you pick Batkovic or Burton affects more than one spot on the team, it would determine what style of basketball the Opals play.

If Joyce has Cambage, Tolo, Cayla George and Batkovic on his frontline, there is no way the team can implement the same game plan as 2014 - full-court defence, aggressively challenging on-balls and pushing the ball hard in transition to wear opponents down.

With a slower, less mobile frontcourt they would have to change the style to a slower half-court grind for large chunks of the game, because if you want to play up-tempo internationally you simply must have multiple players with an athletic advantage over their opposition.

So the big question for Joyce and his coaching staff was whether they spend half of each game with an immobile power forward, giving up their strength of tiring opposition bigs, or continue with the style they have implemented over the past three years with the Hodges-Burton combo a mainstay at the four-spot?

In reality though, it's too late to be making significant changes to a system that's been shown to work, Batkovic isn't mobile enough to play power forward in the existing style, so that means the Townsville Fire star was actually competing with Cambage and Tolo for an Olympic berth, not Burton.

If you are questioning the Burton selection, you either need to come up with a better game style with which Australia could beat the best in the world playing slower basketball, or you need to name players who can better fill that specific role in Joyce's pressure defence based system.

Kelsey Griffin was one possibility - albeit a little undersized - but Leilani Mitchell retained her place as the naturalised player on the team (even though I and many others contend strongly that she should not be considered naturalised given her mother was Australian).

Abby Bishop is another potential power forward choice, but Bishop has struggled mightily on the defensive end in international basketball, having more fouls than points in five of her 15 major tournament games, and only recording more boards than fouls in seven of 15.

After that the cupboard is quite bare, especially if you're looking to replace a player who has been in the program the past three years and performed solidly the past two.

Is Burton a star at international level? Of course not. Is she as important to the Opals as Joyce makes out? I don't think so. But who stands out as a better back-up power forward with the athletic traits to succeed in Joyce's game plan? It's difficult to think of anyone.

Now the big question is whether that game plan works in Rio. If it doesn’t, Joyce will wear serious flack - and lose his job - for deciding to choose what he thought was the best team to suit his style rather than selecting the most talented individuals and moulding a style around them.

If it does work, like at Turkey 2014, and the Opals produce another impressive tournament, I hope the doubters finally admit they are wrong.

Paulo Kennedy

FIBA

FIBA's columnists write on a wide range of topics relating to basketball that are of interest to them. The opinions they express are their own and in no way reflect those of FIBA.

FIBA takes no responsibility and gives no guarantees, warranties or representations, implied or otherwise, for the content or accuracy of the content and opinion expressed in the above article.