The issue of the citizenship of the new Maccabi Tel Aviv guard, Lorenzo Brown, ahead of EuroBasket 2022 has become the talk of the day throughout Spanish basketball in recent weeks. What started with quite a bit of resistance, including from the captain of the team, Rudy Fernandezended with the support of the president of the Spanish union, Jorge Garbajosa, following which the player was included as planned in the squad for the prestigious tournament.
Now, Fernandez himself speaks a little differently about the addition of Brown. “Lorenzo is a player who finally comes to help our team, we must be clear about that,” he admitted, “I prefer players who are connected to the team to a certain extent, even if they are 22 years old. There are players who were partners in the FIBA windows and now they cannot be here, But I spoke with the heads of the association, and I am satisfied that Brown is here with us.”
As mentioned, a few weeks ago Fernandez sounded a little different: “Something here doesn’t feel right to me, and I told that to the president of the union (Jorge Garbajosa). As captain, I had to express my opinion. Unfortunately, I was informed by the media that we have naturalized a player who has no Connection to the country. I gave Garbajosa the examples of Nikola Mirotic and Serge Ivka, the previous nationals in the national team. Although they are foreign players, they grew up in Spanish academies from a very young age and therefore had a special connection to the country. This is not the case here.”
In any case, Brown is expected to be one of the leading players in Sergio Scariolo’s back line. Next to him in the guard positions, you can find (in the extended squad) Sergio Yul, Kino Colum, Alberto Dias and Rudy himself, among others, with Brown expected to be the leading center of La Roja.
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