TUR - Erdogan's advice to Edge, Türkyilmaz

ISTANBUL (Turkey TBL/EuroBasket) - Turkey took their fans on an thrilling ride to the Final of the 2010 FIBA World Championship as hosts of the event.

Led by coach Bogdan Tanjevic and veterans Hedo Turkoglu, Kerem Tunceri, Kerem Gonlum, Omer Onan and Ersan Ilyasova, the Turks played inspirational basketball from start to finish and captured the silver medal.

This past summer in the Qualification Round for EuroBasket 2013, a young Turkish national team competed.

Safak Edge and Izzet Türkyilmaz, who are on the books of Banvit, were among the players.

Turkey struggled, but eventually booked their place in the Final Round in Slovenia.

Edge and Turkyilmaz have tremendous potential.

In order to realize it, their Banvit teammate and former Turkey international Serkan Erdogan has some advice.

"Obviously, they are very talented players but they have a long way to go," said Erdogan to FIBA.com.

Erdogan led the national team in scoring at 15.6 points per game at the 2006 FIBA World Championship.

That Turkey side surpassed expectations and finished sixth.

"Right now, they are in the Turkish national team set-up, but they are not the main players, yet,” Erdogan said.

"They have to keep working hard in practices and given time, they have to show their talent on the court.

"But, they have a long way to go.

"They need to keep their heads down and work hard."

Former national team point guard Orhun Ene, meanwhile, is the Banvit coach and in 2011, he also served as Turkey’s head coach at EuroBasket 2011.

Ene had Türkyilmaz in that squad.

He has coached both players at Banvit for three years.

“I'm very happy that they (Edge and Türkyilmaz) have been in the Turkish national team but they also have to improve their basketball a lot to not just be in the national team for a short period of time," Ene said.

"And they need time.

“But they are working a lot and I hope they can improve and can be starters of the national team in the future.”

FIBA