FIBA - Profile of 2014 FIBA Basketball World Cup wild card candidate: China

MIES (FIBA Basketball World Cup) - On 1 February 2014, FIBA's Central Board will announce the national teams that will be the recipients of the four wild cards to complete the field at the 2014 FIBA Basketball World Cup.

Fifteen national teams from across four FIBA zones submitted their applications for the wild cards. They all participated in their respective 2013 continental championships which are qualifying tournament for FIBA's flagship event in Spain next year (30 August-14 September 2014).

The 15 candidates are: Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brazil, Canada, China, Finland, Germany, Greece, Israel, Italy, Nigeria, Poland, Qatar, Russia, Turkey and Venezuela.

In the lead-up to the decision on 1 February, we will profile all 15 applicants.

Today, we look at China (CHN).

Recent history in international competitions: After losing to Korea and Iran in the Preliminary Round of the 2013 FIBA Asia Championship, China won all three Eighth-Final Round games before meeting Chinese Taipei in the Quarter-Finals. And that's where the record 15-time Asia champions crashed out of the tournament. China, who came into the event as the defending champions, ended up placing fifth - their second-worst showing in continental history following their 10th place in 2007. The Chinese only failed to reach the Final of the continental championship in 1985 and 1997. Still, they have only won the Asian title once since 2005. China have struggled outside of Asia as well, reaching the Quarter-Finals of FIBA's flagship event just once in 1994. They finished 15th and 16th at the 2006 and 2010 editions of the FIBA World Championship, respectively. They came in eighth at the 1996, 2004 and 2008 Olympics and were 12th at the London Games.

The Chinese Basketball Association (CBA) answered some questions to state their case for getting one of the four wild cards for Spain 2014.

FIBA: What are the three main reasons why your country deserves to receive a wild card to participate in the 2014 FIBA World Cup?
CBA: Basketball in China boasts an enormous popularity as the number of people who play the sport in the country is well over a hundred million and there are tens of thousands of teams that participate in the five-on-five and 3x3 format of the game every year. The Chinese men's team has been at the top of the medal table in Asia for many years and also did fairly well at the Olympic Games and FIBA World Championships with quite a few internationally influential players like Yao Ming, Yi Jianlian, Wang Zhizhi...etc coming to the fore. For many years, major national broadcasters including CCTV 5 and quite a few regional channels have broadcast major international events in which Chinese men's teams participated, such as the Olympic Games, the FIBA World Championships, the FIBA Asia Championships, the Asian Games...etc as well as the CBA league. The TV ratings of these games have always been at the top of sport shows. If the Chinese men's team could play at the 2014 FIBA Basketball World Cup, CCTV 5 would for sure continue to broadcast all games of FIBA's flagship event to the world's largest audience of 1.3 billion Chinese people.

FIBA: If given a wild card, how competitive can we expect your country to be and how confident are you that the team will feature all its leading/best players?
CBA: If China is granted a wild card, the CBA commits to sending our best players to Spain 2014. The CBA will take a series of strong measures to re-establish the best coaching team and select the most outstanding players from the CBA league to rebuild a national team, which could best represent Chinese basketball at the FIBA Basketball World Cup.

FIBA: How will having your national team play at the 2014 FIBA Basketball world Cup help the growth, development and popularity of the sport in your country?
CBA: Getting a wild card would mean that the vast number of Chinese basketball fans will continue to get involved in the sport, focus on it and pay much more attention to the FIBA Basketball World Cup.

FIBA: What do you consider as the greatest moment in your country's basketball history?
CBA: The Chinese men's national team finished eighth at the 1994 FIBA World Championship in Canada, the 1996 Atlanta Olympic Games, the 2004 Athens Olympic Games and the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games. China's women's national team won silver medals at both the 1992 Barcelona Olympic Games and the 1994 FIBA World Championship for Women in Australia. It is worthy to note that, due to their brilliance at the 2008 Beijing Games, both Chinese's men's and women's teams received a commendation from the Chinese central government for the first time in the country's history.

FIBA