FRA – Noah out another three weeks

CHICAGO (2010 FIBA World Championship for Men) – France centre Joakim Noah is expected to be sidelined for another three weeks as he keeps battling a stubborn case of plantar fasciitis in his left foot.

Noah has been in and out of the Chicago Bulls starting line-up since the soreness first flared up back in mid-January and the team decided late on Wednesday to shut him down for the next three weeks.

The news will no doubt come as a blow to France head coach Vincent Collet, who would like nothing better than to bolster his roster for the World Championship in Turkey this summer with a player of that calibre.

Les Bleus do not have a flurry of big men at their disposal and were hopeful of making the son of tennis legend Yannick Noah an integral part of their plans.

“It’s frustrating but at the same time I just have to really focus on trying to get healthy and being helpful to the team,” said the third year player out of Florida.

Noah has sat out the last two games and 10 of his team’s last 19 overall, dating back to 15th January when he missed his first contest of the season because of the injury.

He is averaging career bests of 10.7 points and 11.4 rebounds.

“It’s a very difficult injury. It’s very difficult to treat. He might rest for three weeks, he might rest for two months and come back and it’s still bothering him,” Bulls head coach Vinny Del Negro said on Wednesday.

“Rest will help usually, no question. But he’s got to come back, fight through the pain. We’ll give him a few weeks and hopefully he reacts better to that sooner.”

Noah sat out seven games in a row in February and returned to feature in the team’s last four contests of the month. However, rather than start as he has done for most of the season, he came off the bench with the team carefully monitoring his minutes.

The 6ft 11in centre made his international bow with the French national team last summer in their preparation games ahead of the Additional Qualifying Round (AQR) for EuroBasket 2009. He averaged 13 points and 7.5 rebounds in two games played in Strasbourg.

France wanted to keep Noah on the squad for the AQR games against Italy and Finland, but the Bulls refused and he headed back to Chicago.

FIBA