KOR - Beijing berth beckons Asian women

INCHEON (FIBA Asia Championship for Women) - Well begun is half done. So goes the saying. The same thing can be said as this Korean port city fits together the final pieces of the jigsaw for the 22nd FIBA Asia Championship for women from Sunday.
The Championship also doubles up as the Asian zonal qualifiers for the Beijing Olympics 2008 with one team making the grade. Two more teams will play a global Olympic qualifier tournament to take another shot at an opportunity to play at Beijing.
Six teams - playing Level I - match wits for the Olympic berth, while six more battle it out in Level II in a bid to make the Level I at the next Championship.
An extra berth at the Olympics - with China having already by virtue of their host status - is something the entire Asian basketball fraternity is excited about.
"Having two automatic entries into the Olympics is excellent news for Asian basketball," said Dato' Yeoh Choo Hock, Secretary General FIBA Asia.
"Also we'll have two more teams playing the FIBA Olympic qualifiers later in the year. Which means we could just have about four Asian teams in the Olympics. That's fantastic indeed," he added.

First time
The Championship will also witness the National Anthems of the participating teams being played before the start of every match - a first in the history of FIBA Asia Championships.
"We took cue from the World Championship, when we realized how well it looks for the teams to stand for the National Anthems," Yeoh said.
"Also in these days of more and more professional leagues coming up and commercial interests growing in the game, we thought this was one way of restoring the importance of playing for the National team. It surely will be a proud moment for any player to listen to her National Anthem, especially when she is playing abroad," he added.

First step
Incheon shot into the sporting limelight recently having pipped New Delhi at the post in its bid to host the 2014 Asian Games. The city looks forward to this Championship - the first at the Asian level after winning the Asian Games bid - as the first step of showing its organizational capabilities to the rest of the continent.
"Of course, this is the first step towards the 2014 Asian Games," declared Jaemin Lee, the Secretary General of the Korean Basketball Association.
"There are quite a few factors involved in this championship," Lee said. "For starters, the KBA as such has not hosted any major Asian basketball event for almost the last 10 years. Secondly, this stadium is not even a year old. And thirdly, not to forget our Asian Games preparations," he added.
"And then there is the berth for the Beijing Olympics at stake," he said.
"It's not only the basketball we have in mind. We also want all the participating teams, the technical officials and the media to get a good taste of Korean culture," he added.
"We hope Incheon can offer a good mix of excellent basketball and exquisite Korean culture," he said.
So do we!

S Mageshwaran
FIBA