IND - Selection with a long-term goal is most important: Bucan

JOHOR BAHRU (FIBA Asia U16 Championship) - Serbian Aleksandar Bucan - at the helm in the coaching scheme of things in Indian basketball - holds a unique and unusual status on the eve of the inaugural FIBA Asia U16 Championship.

Simply put, the 36-year-old is the only coach in the fray who has a previous experience of winning a U16 medal at any continental championship.

Obviously, this being the first of its kind competition in Asia, the Serbian's achievement came as the Head Coach of his country's cadet National Team in the 2006 European U16 Championship - an event where Spaniard Ricky Rubio started his sensational performances in international competition with an MVP performance.

In an exclusive chat with our website, Bucan spoke of those heady days and shared his thoughts on the current competition.

FIBA Asia: Bucan, you came in as the Indian coach with that U16 Europe medal in your bag enhancing your reputation. What are your thoughts as you head into this Championship?

Bucan: Let me put it this way. As you rightly said, that medal experience in Europe was as much educative, enriching and enormous as it was exciting. That is the experience I have carried all along when carrying out my job in India for various teams at various levels.

I must emphasis at this point that it was that experience that has helped me to help Indian basketball's progress in the recent past. Of course, the support extended by the Basketball Federation of India and its Secretary General Harish Sharma has been enormous.

If you look from the point of view of this particular Championship, it is the selection of players that will hold the key. This is not only for India, but for all the participants.

Good selection of proper players with a long-term goal in mind is the most crucial element for all teams here.

FIBA Asia: What exactly do you mean by this "proper selection"?

Bucan: It's very simple. Teams must select their players for this Championship in a manner that will help strengthen their senior National Teams down the line.

If teams prepare only with the purpose of winning this Championship, then the whole exercise of an U16 competition becomes constrained.

Of course, there are a few teams who can afford to prepare only to win this Championship, but those are a privileged few who already have a development program in place.

For all the other teams, this is a golden opportunity to get their development program in place in proper shape.

FIBA Asia: Do you think the success of European teams in international basketball can be attributed to their long-time program of U16 competitions?

Bucan: I definitely think so. Certainly one of the reasons the European nations have been highly successful is because of a long history of U16 competitions.

Take my own 2006 Serbian team for example.

Branislav Djekic who played under me then is already showing enormous promise in the senior ranks. Dejan Musli is another player who has caught the imagination of the experts.

Then of course, there is Ricky Rubio.

But let me add that these are only examples of big players of today who came from that 2006 competition.

FIBA Asia: Are you implying that replacing the World U21 Championships by FIBA with the World U17 Championships is welcome?

Bucan: Yes. Certainly.

I look at it like this. A player more or less makes his mark as a good potential when he plays the World U19 Championship. After that he gets into the serious business of professional basketball.

Of course he is called for National duties for the World Championships and the Olympics.

If you ask him to interject an U21 event it only adds to his wear and tear, but serving no real purpose.

On the other hand, a U17 event gives us a chance to spot players at a much younger age.

FIBA Asia: What is the one single point you are looking for in this Championship?

Bucan: From a results perspective, I do expect some surprises.

But what I really hope for is to see a player or a group of players about whom people will talk about a couple of years later saying "Hey! We saw these guys first in Johor Bahru"!

To me that will be the most sought after point from this Championship.

S Mageshwaran
FIBA Asia