AUS – Australia U17 coach: “players must become international learners”

HAMBURG (FIBA U17 World Championship) – On Friday Australia’s U17s lost their tournament opener to an impressive Poland team. In spite of this disappointment, Australia head coach Guy Molloy agreed to an interview with fiba.com, in which he discussed his team’s performance and gave his impressions on the specificities of coaching this age group.

FIBA: How do you think your team played?

Molloy: I think that we played two really good quarters and two really bad quarters, which isn’t enough. The up and downs were really poor. Poland are a very good team and they just kept playing consistently.

FIBA: Might nerves have had something to do with this inconsistency?

Molloy: Yeah, I think there certainly were some nerves. It will take time to get into the tournament. We come from a really long way away so we haven’t had very many international games at all. It will take time to adjust.

FIBA: Poland is a very big team and outsize you in some key areas, was this a concern for you?

Molloy: Yeah of course, but we have picked the biggest side we had available to us. It is an issue but there’s nothing we can do about it.

Our big guy (Philip Andrew Chircu, 202cm) who came on from the bench did well but maybe some of the other boys didn’t rebound all that well.

Our shooters have to do a little better, we were 4 of 22 attempts for three and two were made by Dumovic, so the guards didn’t shoot the ball well and we didn’t move the ball all that well to find open spots.

FIBA: Your impressions on this Championship so far?

Molloy: There’s some great talent here. As for Hamburg, the organisers have bent over double to welcome us.

FIBA: So having added an U17 World Championship to the events calendar makes sense to you?

Molloy: Yes, and I think it will be here to stay. Cadet basketball is so strong over here in Europe. It is all very experimental for us.

FIBA: What is the one key thing players this age and at this level can and need to learn from playing here?

Molloy: That there’s no substitute for being a good fundamental player. Some of our kids aren’t complete basketball players. So we try to use this to get them to understand that being a complete player is very important and that they must train at the highest possible level.

FIBA: World Championships always see different styles clashing, but few of these players play teams from other continents regularly. Is that something you try to make your players aware of?

Well, I am really used to it, I am coaching at my fourth World Championship. It is something we try to explain to the boys a lot. Our first game against Poland was very different from what we will face when play Canada in our second game, which will be different still from Korea. We must make adjustments from watching the video tape and execute those adjustments.

FIBA: So how important is the ability to adapt and adjust quickly?

It is very important. One of our prime concepts we call “being an international learner” and it should be that the coach is able to explain something to you one time and you should be able to execute that.

Some of our boys may need something explained five or six times. The players they are facing are too good and if they do not adjust that first time we pay the penalty.

FIBA