Once a month, this column will be dedicated to looking at how an individual country dealt with the worldwide pandemic surrounding Covid-19 and what steps they are taking to avoid youngsters missing out on development.

REGENSBURG (David Hein's Eye on the Future) - Spanish basketball fans can breath a slight sigh of relief as it appears that the country was able to get through the Covid-19 worldwide pandemic with a little more than a black eye in terms of youth development. That being said, there is still some concern that things might be in fact more serious down the road.

First off, let's see who was able to spend the 2020-21 season on the court in Spain. The Spanish ACB first division actually increased the number of teams in the professional first division by one team to 19 after no clubs were relegated to the LEB Gold second flight following the 2019-20 campaign.

At the youth ranks, the U18 and U16 leagues were allowed to play the entire regular season, albeit with some restrictions in some regions. And the country even hosted the Spanish youth national championships in June 2021 with Barcelona taking the U18 crown and Real Madrid hoisting the U16 trophy.

 
All of the competitions were played with pre-game Covid checks - either a PCR or antigen test to protect as much as possible the players and all members of the competitions.

During the pandemic in general and over the course of the 2020-21 season in particular, the Spanish basketball federation FEB collaborated with the clubs under the guidance of the government to make sure youngsters were staying as active as possible.

"The idea was to give chances to practice and play games during the worst moments, always according to government rules and restrictions," said FEB technical manager Jose Ignacio Hernandez.

The national youth leagues were able to go on without a hitch, but some of the regional or local leagues were restricted - due to different measures taken in each region in accordance with the regional governments which ultimately did lead to some stoppages.

Jose Ignacio Hernandez

Some teams were limited to their use of gyms, which meant the FEB stepped in to help the clubs on how to best assist their young players.

"Because of having less training time, instead of the development of individual skills and individual techniques there was more time devoted to the development of collective tactics," Hernandez said. "I modified the physical work done by the teams, having to dispense with resources that impacted the physical work of the players."

FEB officials say they feel comfortable in general with the status of country’s older youth categories - U16 and older, and mostly at the U14 level as well. But Hernandez said those age groups below that could be an issue.

"In some regions U10 and U12 teams had more problems to start playing again," he said.

This past summer, Spain, who are ranked third in the FIBA Youth Men World Rankings Presented by NIKE, were able to compete at two of the three youth FIBA European Challengers, winning the U18 event in which they participated and finishing second at its FIBA U20 European Challenger. The federation had to pull out of the FIBA U16 European Challenger after the team's preparations were disrupted due to complications caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

 
Every day life is getting closer to pre-pandemic levels in Spain, and the country’s youth basketball leaders are diligently trying to assist players who may have lost development time. But it is not an easy task.

"It's difficult to recover the lost time," Hernandez admitted. "Only in the youth national teams will we have additional stages with the generations most affected by the pandemic."

Hernandez regretted to say that those hit hardest will be the youngest players.

"The generations most affected are going to be the smallest, as they have been the hardest hit and have been able to train and compete the least," he explained.

Hernandez singled out the 2008 and 2009-born generations as those who will be most impacted, and maybe even the 2010-born group.

And Hernandez and those in charge at the FEB know they have a lot of work to do to make sure those aren’t lost generations.

"They will not be able to recover their previous level for their age until they can practice and play regular tournaments over the next two or three years," he said.

So, what looks like a black eye right now may actually be much more grave if something is actually truly broken and remains untreated. But to know that for certain, Spanish basketball officials and fans will have to wait a few years.

David Hein
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.

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