Czech Republic's Whitfield To Miss Qualifying CampaignMaurice Whitfield will play no part in the Czech Republic's EuroBasket qualifiers after head coach Zdenek Hummel declared "our patience is over".
Whitfield, who is based in America but has a Czech passport, has been left out of Hummel's final squad after delaying his arrival date with the team.
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| Zdenek Hummel | ||||
"We made a decision not to use Whitfield in our team in this qualification. Our patience is over," said Hummel.
"Whitfield wanted to come on Sunday [instead of Thursday] night so we announced our decision to him.
"He fully accepted our decision. I think it is the right one considering our other players who make a great gang.
"It was very difficult decision for me but I think the right one."
The players who will be playing in the Czech Republic's Division A, Group C matches, meanwhile, finished their preparations with an 88-56 victory over Estonia in their final warm-up.
Jiri Welsch top-scored with 20 points, receiving good support from Petr Benda who scored 12 and Lubos Barton who weighed in with 11 points and seven rebounds.
Assistant coach Pavel Budinsky said: "We analysed the first game against this opponent on video and we prepared to eliminate their biggest advantages.
"All 12 players fully concentrated on the game and we played very good zone defense in the second quarter.
"Estonia were nervous in this part of the game and we took more than 10 points advantage. We controlled the game until the end after that."
Czech Republic squad: Pavel Benes (CEZ Basketball Nymburk), Stepan Vrubl (Handicap Brno), Jiri Welsch (Unicaja Malaga), Lubos Barton (Joventut Badalona), Ladislav Sokolovsky (CEZ Basketball Nymburk), David Hajek (Mlekarna Kunin), Pavel Milos (BK Prostejov), Jaroslav Prasil (NH Ostrava), Ondrej Starosta (SIG Strasbourg), Petr Benda (A Plus ZS Brno), Jakub Houska (BK Decin), Zbynek Pospisil (NH Ostrava).
