What about these Americans?

TURKEY (The View from Downunder) - Take away any country's entire team from their previous major international tournament and make them build from scratch, and they are going to struggle.

Of course, when it comes to basketball the USA is not just any country. They are as close as it gets to a factory for basketball stars. Not only do they produce great players who fill the highlight reels and high quality athletes who fill out 80% of NBA rosters, but leagues around the world count numerous American born players amongst the best in their competitions.

Every two years they feature in the medals at FIBA underage world championships, and they have dominated women's basketball for as long as anyone can remember.

So, talent wise, if any country has the depth to bring in a completely new team and still succeed it is the USA. Have a look at the new players who have come in this year - Kevin Durant, Derrick Rose, Chauncey Billups, Rudy Gay and Rajon Rondo - all NBA stars in their own right.

Add in Tyson Chandler, Lamar Odom, Stephen Curry and Andre Iguodala who are all super players with particular skills that can translate to the international game. There is no shortage of talent in this 2010 US team.

But talent isn't the issue. Jerry Colangelo knows that.

Starting with the 2000 Olympics it became clear the 'best of the rest' were starting to close the gap. The US practice of giving different NBA stars the chance to represent their country each tournament meant that the Americans were a team of rookies competing against experienced FIBA veterans, cancelling out the athletic advantages they enjoyed.

After the disastrous - by US standards - 2002 and 2004 campaigns, Colangelo knew that his country needed to train their best players in the international game. Three super young players - Carmelo Anthony, Dwyane Wade and LeBron James - were carried over from 2004 to 2006 and three more carried on to the 2007 FIBA Americas Championship.

By the time the Beijing Olympics came around, all 12 players had played in FIBA competitions before, five of them more than once, and eight of them at an Olympics or FIBA World Championship prior to 2008.

The results spoke for themselves.

Mix that experience with the sheer talent level in the team - with future Hall of Famers like Kobe Bryant, Wade, James, Anthony, Dwight Howard and Jason Kidd, this team is comparable with the original Dream Team - and in hindsight gold was the only realistic result.

But come 2010 we are going back to the future, with a US team that is going to have to learn the FIBA game in a hurry.

Yes, Billups, Chandler and Odom have played in international tournaments before, but their talent level is not close to the leaders of the 2008 team, and none of this trio played major roles on the previous US teams they were on.

The 86-55 scoreline as the US thrashed France in New York this week was pretty impressive, but the performance itself was not. The offence consisted almost exclusively of down screens, pick and rolls, and isolations.

The majority of scores came from forcing turnovers and motoring in transition, or shots created by one-on-one play. And come the FIBA World Championship in Turkey, this will be more than enough to win most games.

Winning most games is not enough though. For the USA, the only result that is acceptable is gold, especially when the last FIBA World Championship gold medal came in 1994.

But for that drought to break in 2010 the team has to find a way to bring out each other's strengths and be disciplined for the full 40 minutes. This line-up has the athleticism to destroy teams defensively, but in the French game their were far too many minor lapses at that end of the court that teams like Argentina, Greece, Serbia and Spain will punish.

Offensively there are some major strengths - the shooting of Curry and Billups, the offensive rebounding of Odom, the ability of Rose and Rondo to create and the ability of Durant and Gay to finish. Looking at the team together on the floor at this early stage, though, they do not yet know how all that talent fits into the one jigsaw.

Coach Krzyzewski has done nothing but build on his great reputation during his time as US coach, but even he has his work cut out here. Only Spain has as much talent but they have years of experience up their sleeve, as do Greece.

The US can beat all those teams on any night, the big question is can they learn the intricacies of the international game quick enough to win three tough games - quarter, semi and final - in three consecutive nights.

After warming into things with easy wins over China and France, this week's games against Lithuania and Spain provide them with a step up in company and another chance to progress their game.

You can bet both European teams are aware of this and will be happy to run and gun and trade shots with the Americans, content in the knowledge they will be providing as little FIBA education as they possibly can.

Paulo Kennedy
FIBA