i still dont know how Mathiang is playing for South Sudan when his played for Australia

Because Australia granted his release

Same as Eric Gordon now playing for the Bahamas after previously playing for the USA.

"USA Basketball granted Gordon's release and FIBA approved his change of country representation due to Article 22 of its Internal Regulations.

"Article 22 prohibits a player from changing national team allegiance once he has participated in a major FIBA competition. Gordon previously competed for the USA in the 2010 FIBA World Cup. The article can be amended at FIBAs discretion if the player is joining a developing national team program and the move is deemed "in the best interest of basketball."

The last cut of the squad will be made sometime after tonight's game against SSD.

Following Thursday's clash with South Sudan Australia will trim the current 13-man roster down to 12 players before heading to Okinawa for the start of the FIBA World Cup.

Goulding's injury (not sure how minor/severe) probably came at a bad time for him
We kind of need his shooting though

Olgun wrote:

"The Australian Boomers plan to take 13 players to Tokyo, Japan for their warmup game against France on Aug. 20, a Basketball Australia spokesperson confirmed to ESPN. The Boomers face Georgia in Okinawa on Aug. 22, which is the date in which the 12-man team must be finalised."

Olgun wrote:

No Joe Ingles (rest) or Chris Goulding (knee) for the Australian Boomers for tonight's World Cup warmup game vs South Sudan. Both Jock Landale and Josh Green are listed on the score sheet, and expected to play.

Who's the young guy doing the warmups and sits on the bench for the Boomers ? I can't put a name to his face. Doesn't play any minutes.

Harry Wessels

Harry Wessels no 10 currently attending St Mary's

Hopefully training with the Boomers will help Harry's development. We lack size and he’s got that covered

I just saw South Sudan have a 16 year old playing for them, who is 7'1".

Liam Santamaria make that man a Next Star.

14 Boomers are suited up
But Goulding and Joe not warming up

Don't forget the "Mad Rise" doco is on after the game

Ok..... now Goulding has joined the warmup late…

Starting lineup:

Giddey
Mills
Green
Kay
Landale

Pretty good effort with the anthem by the players. Although I'm not sure Giddey was as excited as he should have been. Let's hope he gets it right by the time the WC begins.

Our offence sucks right now

And Landale looks absolutely cooked

@twenty four LOL

Oh-oh. That didn't look good for Landale

Hopefully Landale injury minor - may mean Jack White goes after all

They need maker or Pinder if Landale is out

There's a Rockets rep in the change room right now packing Jock's suitcase back for Houston

Are our old vets becoming obsolete?

The bench are better than the starters, landale and Kay are too slow for the up tempo defence and offence play by these boomers.

Yep he gone. Like the idea of bringing in Maker.

Other than make plenty money I'm not certain what Maker has done for everyone to think he should be in the team

Thybulle a complete different player on defensive end tonight!

You mean dominating in qualifiers and at the asia cup

Nick Kay is so slow that he is never able to leave the right place at the right time quickly

Amazing what happens when you play with a little bit of space and ball movement...

This great ball movement.

They're starting to take the piss a bit too much now. Understandable, but bad habits.

Nick Kay has been good tonight and don't know how you can say Landale is too slow when he hasn't even played, and is quicker than Duop Reath

Genuine question.
If Landale is ruled out because of the ankle, can/will the boomers call up another previous cut big - Pinder or Maker.
If yes, would they choose to rejoin the team?

yes they can. Barlow was called into the Boomers 2019 WC team after Bolden pulled out. And before that Creek was called into the team as a replacement for the injured Cooks but Creek unlike Barlow was in the squad originally.

Thanks Zodiac.
I do recall those inclusions now that you mentiin it

Daniels hardly playing, surely he's cut.

Cool to see Harry Wessels playing

Did Thybulle learn how to shoot? Or is he just on one tonight?

He's on one tonight but he's also not as bad as people say

Man I love Dyson, but the poor body language the last two games isn't the best sign ....

I thought Daniels would do more for the Boomers too.

Thybulle shot fine for Portland

Yeah I've seen enough, I think Dyson has to go.

White, Cooks and Goulding all provide different elements that are valuable. I think we need all of them.

Dyson, at best, will just be a backup perimeter defender. We've already got that covered.

I'll tell you who really needs to go: the person who’s been blasting shitty music all game every game so far at this event.

Daniels is disinterested and even if he has already been told he was cut, he should be trying to prove people wrong.

Hahahaha... Ben were/are you the Bullets music guy aka MrBen??

I think those couple of bad possessions by Daniels a bad pass to Cooks and then stripped the next time down should seal his fate.

He would not be acting this way unless already notified.

Hello Simon ;)

Can anyone explain why Wessels is in the squad rather than other young guys like Ducas or Zikarsky, or established ones like Thon Maker?

" He would not be acting this way unless already notified."

I've wondered that too

But if he's the first emergency in case of injury ... wouldn’t make sense to look so disinterested

Hey Ben... 25 years on bball chats… you're one of my oldest 'friends’ lol. Hope you’re going well

Yeah wanted to keep Dyson in the team for the experience but have to admit he looked like he should be the cut, especially now if we are down a big.

Wessels is just a training player he's not in the squad.

There were a few encouraging signs in this game but it's still scraggly and ugly to watch. To score 90 without Mills making any kind of real scoring punch is promising. Defensively much better than last night, but once again, this is against lesser competition that will struggle to leave the group.

As we know, the way they play these warm up is different to how they'll play in the tournnamnet.

Regardless, the big concern is Jock. Ankles can be funny and sometimes players can come baack from that relatively quickly, and it may have looked worse than it really is. But it definitely seems to be injury season coming into this cup for every team. I am not sure why. if it's play style or what. But I just can't remember guys getting injured quite so much before now.

I think moving forward you'd put Jock on ice for the rest of the warm ups and I'm sure they'd take him over to Japan. For me it's going to be a stepped recovery with the main question being 'can we get him right for the second round?"

If you can suit him up game 1 against Finland, fine. If not, can we get him against Germany? You could rest him against Japan without it being a concern.

I think they'll take him but dont be surprised if a Pinder or Maker gets a call up to be ready and in Japan should the worst come about. But if there is no Landale I find it hard to imagine this team medalling, and on all I've seen so far, it's already a bit of a stretch unless a lot is not being shown to us.

Olgun repirting:

Brian Goorjian says Jock Landale will not he on the plane tomorrow to Japan. Landale will have an MRI tomorrow, but Goorjian doesn't expect him to be available for the world cup.



Well. We're in trouble

Yeah... I am struggling to see how we go too far without him. I want to be wrong but...

Now we have a harder time beating Germany and Finland. It's heartbreaking to see us get knocked out in the first round, but it's nearly impossible to win in FIBA Ball without a Big.
(Reath is doing really well, but he lacks the power to defend the European big.)

It must either be really bad if they've already ruled him out for the entire world cup, or maybe Houston have pulled him out?

A lot of people saying bring Pinder or Maker, but we still have 12 available now. I feel it's more likely they'll just roll with the 12 we have now. Assuming Goulding is healthy.

Thybulle is regarded as one of our weaker wing shooters but that is a relative mark, from their last professional seasons this Boomers team is now much improved in that area

Joe Ingles at Milwaukee 40.9
Jack White G League. 40.9
Josh Green last season 40.2
Thybulle at Portland. 38.8
Goulding last NBL 38.4 at 2' closer.

Also watched all games live and the music was 10x quieter than in Adelaide so maybe the TV mikes were set up in the wrong place.

I have a feeling Houston may have pulled the pin. It's hard to imagine they'd make that call so soon.

Flying tomorrow would not be helpful for the swelling.
It could just be medical advice.

I don't think Landale is coming back.
If we don't call Maker, the final list looks like this.

Giddey / Exum / Daniels
Green / Mills / Goulding
Thybulle / Ingles
White / Kay
Reath / Cooks

But this may not be the final list either. That's because Goulding is also injured.
If I were the Head coach, I would call up Maker as soon as possible.

Agree. Maker is a must if Landale can't go.

Reath / Maker
Kay / Cooks / White
Thybulle / Ingles
Mills / Green / Goulding
Giddey / Exum

That team can still do damage, albeit a bigger challenge without Jock.

I agree Maker should go but my prediction is the coaching staff will just run with the 12 they have.

Pretty big ask to fly a player over to Japan before Sunday, let alone integrate them properly into the team and learn the structures.

Let me ask you one more time.
Can FIBA Patty really come back?

Patty vs Venezuela
fg 3-9 / 2p 2-3 / 3p 1-6

Patty vs Brazil
fg 2-13 / 2p 0-1 / 3p 2-12

Patty vs South Sudan
fg 4-13 / 2p 2-6 / 3p 2-7

Why did they have wessels this week instead of Maker? Was it just terrible timing where they had already let maker go when Landale had first been injured?

Maker needs to go.

It's a no brainer unless he's told them he's unavailable, which seems exceedingly unlikely.

Nah Maker isn't going.

Goorj just confirmed in his press conference that the team will not bring any additional players to the team. This 12 is the final team.

Goorj also said that if Jock somehow comes good, then the final cut is "out of Chris and Jack."

Massive news there.

Looks like Australia's team all but confirmed, and if Jock does come back, Dyson Daniels will stay on.

Agree on Maker being needed.
If he's not available, then get Pinder.
In any case, one of them to help bolster the 5 spot is a must.

BTW, loving Green's energy and enthusiasm tonight.
He's looking ready to really compete hard at this WC

Also from Goorj's comments, he pretty much said it had been planned for weeks that Jack White was going to be the final cut, unless Chris Goulding was unable to come back from his knee.

Of course now this isn't the case. But if Landale does come back, we can all but lock in Jack to be the cut.

I agree Knockdown3, Green looked good tonight. Just needs to get his shot falling.

Goorj said he expects Josh Green to start throughout the world cup, with Thybulle playing a major role off the bench, as he is "more comfortable there."

When you see something like this, the natural reaction and the one I do feel is one of, what is the point in even playing this tournament? Just feels like success at the level the Boomers would strive for is out of reach. But there's another part of me that wants to be wrong, and wants to ask "how can we do this?" So... i guess that's my question, how can THIS Boomers team that we have here, medal in the world cup?

The only answer I can come up with is we need to run teams off the floor. We have to go 12 deep and we have to be relentless. We have to play full court defense and not let teams get into their half court sets where they can utilize size advantages. The team was already leading that way with Jock anyway, and now it seems like there's really no other choice. With Jack White being the proposed last cut of the team, this really is subbing Jack White for Jock Landale. So is it, then, a big change to the Boomers plans? Maybe not to the extent that we would initially guess.. small ball was always the name of the game.

We also need to keep in mind that, yes we are smaller now, but we are still very big in the guards and on the wing. A lot of other teams are smaller too.

We have won points in paint and rebound count in every warmup game I believe.

The USA only have Jaren Jackson Jr. (who plays as a PF in the NBA) and Walker Kessler as Centres, and Kessler has barely played in warmup games. When Jackson isn't on the floor, they play small ball with Bobby Portis at the 5 normally.

Finland aren't big aside from Markannen.

Japan are always small.

Germany have Theis, Weightmann and the Wagner brothers which is more of a problem. But Theis is only 6'8 and the Wagner's aren't big interior players.

But the more I look past the initial feeling of doom as described by ME, the more I think we are still can be a very good team.

I reckon the France game will answer a lot of questions, especially going against Gobert.

I meant Voigtmann for Germany, not Weightmann sorry.

Small ball is all about switching defense, but most importantly, every player must be able to hit outside shots.
You might say, "Well, didn't we win the Tokyo Olympics with small ball?" Well, we had FIBA Patty then. We relied a lot on Patty because we lacked shooting ability as a whole.
But now we don't have FIBA Patty, or even Landale, who is the only old school big man we can say we have.
Our depth is better than it was in the Olympics, so why is our offense so bad?
The answer is shooting.
It has to be one or the other for the Boomers to win.
Either FIBA Patty comes back, or every player's outside shot has to go in at a certain percentage.

I'm still in the pessimistic camp here. It's much more than just White for Landale. It's more than the loss of a big, the loss of a defensive presence, the loss of team balance, the loss of our only reliable stretch big. It's also Giddey's effectiveness that will be badly affected. We hadn't yet seen Giddey's PnR with Landale, but surely that would've been utilised well in the World Cup.

To go anywhere, we need a consistently strong defense, including somehow dealing with opposition bigs, and a massive improvement in our shooting. Top 8 will be an achievement.

I should say one of two reliable stretch bigs. Kay should be included.

I'm feeling pessimistic now.

But, let's see what happens. Sport is full of surprises.

Maker should be pissed, dude has always been one of the first to put his hand up.
Pinder though hasn't been training fully with Perth, so clearly that injury is still lingering.

I'm pessimistic, too.
From the time Boomers first preliminary roster was released until now, I've cited the Centers as the biggest problem and weakness.
Can Landale and Reath do well with just two players?
Hell, they don't even have Landale anymore. Landale is an irreplaceable player who should play 25-30 minutes for Boomers.
Reath can play the Center in the NBA, but he's a Power Forward in FIBA.
He can't defend Center in FIBA.
Against the Boomers, Caboclo had a 20-12 record. Caboclo played like Shaquille O'Neal. Reath was unable to defend Caboclo and often gave up on defending him.
You hear that Kay, Cooks, and White are all good defenders, but that's within their positions. None of them could defend Caboclo.
Was Caboclo the best big man in FIBA? No.
If your inside defense is weak, your outside defense is automatically weak, because you have to play help defense.
Slovenia loses despite having Doncic because they have a weak inside defense.

Why did you exclude Maker? Well, Maker is not a Center either. He has great height but weak strength.
He was unable to defend Zhou Qi in the World Cup qualifiers.
But he has an advantage that the current Boomers doesn't have. That is his height.
The Australia national team in the World Cup qualifiers is different from the current Australia national team. There are many players who can utilize Maker and he can help the team defensively.

Slovenia lose because they only have Doncic. There is a difference.

So in a way, you're right.
That's why if they had a really good Center, the results would have been better.
They finished 6th in the EuroBasket last year and 4th in the Olympics.

I am still baffled as to why Jack White was going to be the last cut. It seems like Gootjian wanted absolutely no back up big man options at all. If the Boomers do have a bit of a forgettable campaign some of the blame must rest at his feet. Why?

1) he choose to cut the squad down early
2) he chose to get rid of Pinder ans Maker while Jock was already under an injury cloud
3) he's not even entertaining the thought of bringing another big man through to even have a look at what that might add to the team

You have to question his judgement when he was looking to go even smaller and drop White on a team that already was small and already had injury questions and for which big men is already the weakness.

Moving forward I think White has gone from 13th man to absolute necessity given his size, strength, athleticism and shooting ability. And we are really going to have to combat size with athleticism and grit if we hope to best thr France, Spain's of the world

I think there's still potential for the team to be very well. Slovenia are small. I remember the silver medal Argentina being small but they were full of energy and intensity. It might be a big bonus that most of this team is quite young and they may be able to sustain a high tempo across the tournament.

I am still baffled as to why Jack White was going to be the last cut. It seems like Gootjian wanted absolutely no back up big man options at all. If the Boomers do have a bit of a forgettable campaign some of the blame must rest at his feet. Why?

1) he choose to cut the squad down early
2) he chose to get rid of Pinder ans Maker while Jock was already under an injury cloud
3) he's not even entertaining the thought of bringing another big man through to even have a look at what that might add to the team

You have to question his judgement when he was looking to go even smaller and drop White on a team that already was small and already had injury questions and for which big men is already the weakness.

Moving forward I think White has gone from 13th man to absolute necessity given his size, strength, athleticism and shooting ability. And we are really going to have to combat size with athleticism and grit if we hope to best thr France, Spain's of the world

I think there's still potential for the team to be very well. Slovenia are small. I remember the silver medal Argentina being small but they were full of energy and intensity. It might be a big bonus that most of this team is quite young and they may be able to sustain a high tempo across the tournament.

This is a disaster and unfortunately I saw it coming when we let Pinder and Maker go before we'd even played any games WHILE Landale was already injured. Just crazy thinking.

Did we learn nothing from 4 years ago when they had to take Barlow as a last minute replacement because he was literally the only person around?

They should have injury replacements with the squad until the last possible moment who can be slotted in if needed.

We're gonna struggle against big teams, of which there are two in our group.

At this stage I'm worried about doing what we need to do to even quality for the olympics next year.

The other issue here is Goulding.
Will his injury be able to recover quickly?
Even if he does return, will he be in good shape?
Goulding will also turn 35 in two months.
Goulding is also the reason why 13 people wanted to go to Japan in the first place. It's to keep an eye on his situation.
The quickest thing to do when Landale is out with an injury is to call up Maker.
But the goorjian didn't do that at all.
What if Goulding can't play?
We would be going to the World Cup with 11 players, and we would not be able to use that last spot.
We've all been waiting for four years, and while the outcome is important, so is the process.

I wouldn't say I'm pessimistic, but we have a clear Achilles' heel in our lack of depth inside, which opens us up to some bad match-ups... especially outside of the group stage.

Promising signs though with the D pressure we got from the Green/Thybulle lineup, and I thought Cooks fit in well with that group too. That is going to need to be our trademark. Our halfcourt offense hasn't been ultra impressive - a lot of Giddey trying to create a little too much, and overall pretty predictable. We are going to need our 3 ball to drop if we aren't able to get out and run... Goulding will probably end up featuring more than I expected before these warm up games.

Jock out 4-6
White back in.

Hearing lots of interesting tidbits about some infighting between BA, Mills and players around 'team bus'

Olympics is a mickey mouse tournament compared to worlds and to a degree Eurobasket. 6th in Eurobasket is a big deal.

I get what you're trying to say, but the Olympics is where the best countries have most of their best players. There is nothing mickey mouse about it.

As i posted earlier, the cutting of Maker and Pinder that early really baffled me. Pinder I get now with the injuries but from Maker's social media it looks like he’s still in Sydney doing some work for the South Sudanese community. What would it hurt to reach out to Maker as an emergency defensive and rim protection big? After seeing the Boomers not take him, it would be a shame if the South Sudanese team reaches out to him for the Olympics like they did Mathiang for the WC. He has to be thinking at this stage that the Boomers don’t really want or need him.

My thought is we should definitely call Maker in too, but I have no idea how he performed at camp. He may have stunk it up, I don't know.

If you want a true five man, Maker is not the answer, Humphries would be better suited or see how Baynes is going.

Even if Maker wasn't good in camp, just by being a big body he'd provide more than what Daniels has or Goulding if he can't play?

Regardless of outcomes, this process has been farcical and we've learned nothing from our previous mistakes.

Thinking about this, Argentina made a world cup final with their centre being a 39 year old, 6 foot 9 Luis Scola. Australia still has a very talented roster with distinct strengths. Anything could still happen.

However, it feels like the rotation won't include Dyson Daniels. He hasn't looked confident and the stuff he brings to the table are provided by others ahead of him in the rotation.

Given that's the case, why bring him at all, when we've got a hole elsewhere in the roster? Especially when you've got the 7 foot Thon Maker who just did a week of training camp

The blueprint for thr Boomers will have to be Team USA who have gone to tournaments without traditional bigs for some time now and yet manage to be dominant.

Positives as far as I see is we manage to score 90 points a game and Patty Mills has barely contributed. It says tonme we have a fairly high ceiling offensively despite how clunky and ugly it has been so far.

My thoughts is he would be valuable, but if his performance at camp wasn't at the standard, the coaching staff may think the Reath, Kay, Cooks, White combo is better than having him there.

I still like the idea of having some insurance in case of another injury, but the coaches have a lot more insight into their decision making than we do.

The Olympics doesn't have the best teams is the point.

Yes it does, that's the very nature of the qualifying system.

Olympics always have a higher percentage of bum teams because they have to have representation from Asia and Africa and because it's a shorter, smaller tournament. I'd say at lwSt 40 percent of all teams at the Olympics are garbage.

Again thats the point mouse. The Olympics is the prestigious tournament that everyone wants to win but it is far and away the least competitive/difficult tournament. Eurobasket is a far tougher tournament than the OG's

Agree with Dunkman. We need a big that is primarily subbed in to defend the Gobert's and Theis’ of the world.

We have enough talent and small ball will be fine most of the time. But we have seen some stretch’s in history where the bigs have dominated us play after play.

Humphries, Baynes, Maker. Might not be the firepower but can be subbed in for defence or just a big body. Rather than having yet another guard in the rotation.

Let’s keep things in perspective though. We have a stacked team. Even without Landale it could be argued as one of our most talented groups ever. We are fronting up with 9 NBA players and others that are just aa elite. The game has changed even in FIBA and small ball can work. We play on the strengths we have in a small ball lineup. We have some of the best shooters in the world (ingles, Patty and green have all had stints at the top 3pt%), we have elite perimeter defenders in Thybulle and green, we have one of the best passers in the league in Giddey, we have an excellent balance of leaders and young guys with a lot of energy. We haven’t seen anything yet- our team is in 2nd gear. There would be teams having nightmares about facing us.

Thanks for the pick me up patty I needed that!

Love the positive attitude 'pattymillsMVP' - great way to look at things!

That's a great comment.
We'll have to hope that Patty's shots go in in the remaining two scrimmages.

Perhaps Maker did one too many kicks at camp, to keep in shape in case his kick-boxing was needed again LOL

Seriously, though, Maker seems obvious because of his height, outside shooting and athleticism, which is what Landale brought. I can't think of too many others who bring those 3 attributes and have the maturity to play at this level. Most of the other centres in contention are too slow down the court, which won't suit an athletic team like we have now.

I think two things against Maker might be his attitude and his lack of body. With a Landale or Baynes defending a big guy, the other 4 guys on defence could generally depend on our centre to shut down the big guy, and could concentrate on guarding their own players and reading screens and all that. With someone light such as Maker, they couldn't be that confident, and would constantly be having to provide help with the risk of letting their own guy get free for a shot or whatever. In other words, when Maker's on and we're defending, we'd risk being burnt from the 3.

I don't agree with releasing the big guys so early, but I'm sure there was a valid reason; I just wish Goorj would explain what it was.

Personally I think we're screwed without replacing Landale and I think Goorjian has messed up a fair bit with non-selections.

Even though he didn't deserve to be there on form I was baffled Baynes was left out of the 18 man squad. A solid big body who has done it all before would've been very handy. The cutting of Maker long before he needed to be cut is also strange. Then Goorj saying Reath is probably going to make the team after his dominant first game suggested the coach wasn't sold on him either.

Now Landale goes down and we're effectively replacing him with White, who has contributed well but is only 6'7", we should be cutting a superfluous player like Daniels too and bringing in a Maker, Baynes or even Pinder.

I think there is still potential for this team to medal but from what I've seen so far it's definitely looked disjointed. I agree we can probably get away with small ball for most of the tournament but against Germany, France, Spain potentially Serbia, it's a bit hard to say. Can out athleticism and length in other positions help us overcome that lack of size.. and are we strong enough at those positions to present opposition bigs getting easy inside touches?

I also don't think the game against France will give us much insight on how we will overcome that. They're going to be playing with cards close to their chest in that game. Both teams will. I don't think we will see the real Boomers until game 1 against Finland.

Hoopie you posted about the cutting of Maker the following :"I think two things against Maker might be his attitude and his lack of body."
Maker has always been a stand up guy so where is the attitude. Also watching him in China his body has changed a bit since being in the NBA. He's definitely stronger and put on weight while keeping his athleticism. Where is it said that he had an attitude problem?

Luis Scola was a great big with a soft touch who used his smarts to score more than his athleticism, was not surprised at all when he helped Argentina in to the finals.

If they choose to bring in a late replacement to help at centre I would go with Baynes. Go with the experience and strength.

Maybe another thing affecting Maker's selection was his playstyle in China?

From looking at some vision he seems to be much more perimeter oriented in the CBA. He's got a license the handle the ball, shoot step backs etc. Maybe that's become his playstyle, more of a stretch big who plays the 4?

Just thinking out loud

Also thank goodness Duop Reath is in some good form currently as well. He's been cooking.

I trust Goorg, these tournaments are very hard, we have a great side, sometimes it can be a flip of the coin or in Boguts case a few years back a bad decision that cost us at least silver. It's not all doom no matter how we finish.

I think you nailed it Max.
Maker's game does appear to be less interior oriented, and could very well be the reason why he wasn't selected as a back up 5.

The question remains, if we dont call in a legit 5 to replace Landale, can we get away with being small in the front court?
Potentially it could work, but we will need to execute well at both ends, and go deep to stay fresh to run teams off their game.
Green etc are looking super important in that regard.

Goorjian is never over complicated offensively but I'd suggest the Boomers are not showing their full hand just yet in terms of what we will be running. Pretty vanilla up till this point and gotta feel for Caporn when he drew up a SOB play at the end of the Brazil game which turned to shit.

^Dunkman, and some blatant textbook Spanish flopping

They look like a less talented version of the USA

Kay and duop eating the the 5 man minutes, Thybulle plenty of 4, cooks and white eating the remains PF minutes.

Gonna have to play helter skelter defence, full court press, gotta maximise the athletes playing fast

Gotta run on offense as well, the half court is mostly Giddeys creating and hopefully Patty can keep the score ticking over...

DraftBust, in his previous time with the Boomers, he worked hard but I felt that some of his decision-making was a bit selfish, and he played a bit too much for the ref call to bail him out (& became a bit 'unfocused' when he didn’t get it).

I’d be very happy if both of those issues have disappeared.

I trust Goorj and the senior players to get the best result out of whoever is in the final 12.

What I dont trust is BA to put into place the process that ensures our best possible 12 is there.

I know I'm harping on this but after the Barlow callup in 2019 and the last minute Liz replacement for the Opals in Tokyo, how have we not learned from mistakes?

If Landale and Goulding had been 100% fit at the start of this week I sense it was Duop who far from a lock and was fighting for his spot - ie Goorj was very much aiming for fast pace, intense D and wasnt overly fussed about needing a traditional centre in the team as a back up to Landale anyway.

Landale tweaks an ankle, Duop plays great and Goorj makes his call, now Landale is out properly and we are back where Goorj was originally with just 1 real centre and a full crew of wings ready to play in your face defence all game.

Yes if we get more injuries we are probably screwed, but thats always the case going into these tournaments. Im sure Goorj and the team know exactly what their game plan is and have chosen to go with the squad they have rather than Maker for very good reasons

Not doom and gloom no matter how we finish? I do disagree with this. If you come in expecting to medal and bow out in the first or second round that is doom and gloom to me especially when certain decisions earlier in the piece could have made us less susceptible to the issues that seem to be apparent here, ie keeping more bigs in the squad for longer.

Goorjian pick
Giddey / Exum / Daniels
Mills / Goulding
Green / Thybulle
Kay / Ingles / White
Reath / Cooks

My pick
Giddey / Exum / Daniels
Green / Mills / Goulding
Thybulle / Ingles
White / Kay
Reath / Cooks

I chose this lineup based solely on balance and synergy, ignoring all of the players' contributions and accomplishments to the Boomers.

Bogut said that Giddey and Mills shouldn't play together, and I agree. (Sure, they can play together in the fourth quarter.)

Giddey lineup
Giddey has a lot of ball possession, so we set him up with players who are athletic, off-the-ball movement and can catch and shoot.

Mills lineup
Exum doesn't have long possessions and can play defense. Ingles, Kay, and Cooks can all make good passes to Mills. This lineup also compensates for Cooks poor shooting ability.

I'm hearing that Maker is more of a 4 than a 5 but wouldn’t it make more sense to keep him as a 4 switching 5 defensively and on offense play the 4. I see him more of an offensive and perimeter threat than Cooks and gives better value on the defensive end. I think that some of the "highlights" focus on clicks but I see his potential value here when he played for the Boomers:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=QdBaY4NSnPA

Should they not bring more than 12 with still friendlies to go?
Look at most other teams and they are 16-18 deep even after 5-6 friendlies already.

Seems like BA are being morons again and you see a few of the hierarchy on holiday with the team in cairns and Melbourne with notepads.
We should be bringing atleast 15 to all 5 friendlies. The fact we have seen Wessels play over maker is ridiculous.

Yeah the wessels thing is confusing. Oh he's there for experience? That's great. He got that in camp. How about tagging someone along who can help in situations EXACTLY LIKE THIS???

Is Wessels even the future or the program or should it be Zilarsky out there? I'm not trying to shit on the guy. I don't know him. But it's not like he's on NBA draft boards. If he impressed in camp, great. But I don't see the need to tag him along further in lieu of someone more ready.

For what it's worth, and take what you will from the markets, we were second favourites equal with France and Canada pre Landale injury and we remain equal second favourites post injury.

Landale isn't great defensively but can hold his own, is a big body and did fairly well on Joker in the playoffs. Without him, we are gonna get eaten alive in the interior.

"Should they not bring more than 12 with still friendlies to go?
Look at most other teams and they are 16-18 deep even after 5-6 friendlies already.

Seems like BA are being morons again and you see a few of the hierarchy on holiday with the team in cairns and Melbourne with notepads.
We should be bringing atleast 15 to all 5 friendlies. The fact we have seen Wessels play over maker is ridiculous."

Agreed 100%

is Makur maker a future boomer?

@KWhite_Rulze
"Without him, we are gonna get eaten alive in the interior."

^100%

It's baffling that we can see this, yet either BA and/or the coach can't.
I really hope they have a plan that we don't know about to mitigate our interior deficiency.
I agree with ME, early (and unnecessary) decisions might really cost us.

Regarding our medal chances and what would constitute a pass/fail, the consistent talk by the players and others of gold, while being an obvious aspiration, is potentially generating self imposed pressure.

Do we actually have anyone that will move the ticker?

I think the biggest issue is not getting the automatic Olympics entry and having to go about it the hard way based on nbl player availability.

Yep, definitely a chance for disaster here with a failure to lock in that OQ spot. I still wouldnt say its likely, but its definitely possible and would be obviously disastrous

When it comes to a plan we don't know about, yes I hope that too. It seems like small ball was the name of the game from the start though, so the idea that we may get manhandled inside surely must have been considered before the injury. What gives me hope is we have been the most consistent national team of the last decade and in that time we've had to adapt to the Baynes injury, Bolden walking out, and a range of other occurrences so we have had to be resilient and adaptable.

"Again thats the point mouse. The Olympics is the prestigious tournament that everyone wants to win but it is far and away the least competitive/difficult tournament."


It's clearly not, because the best teams from the WC qualify for the Olympics. Then, the next best teams who may miss out due to geography get to make it through the OQT. Then the drawcard of the Olympics means more of the best players from the best countries are there.

Expecting a medal versus aiming for a medal ... Regardless of pre-tournament betting odds and poll favourites and all that, it's usually the media who exaggerate our players’ comments and our chances in order to get more clicks and viewing audience, and guys like Ingles love to take the piss out of them.
I would see top 8 as a realistic goal with Landale, and be very happy with top 4; without Landale, I would be very happy with top 8 & dancing naked round the room if they make top 4.

As for the "can’t BA or Goorjian see the obvious problems", Goorjian is clever and experienced enough to have multiple game plans. However, his hands will be tied by whatever BA and the NBA impose on him, and whoever makes themselves available. He’s certainly not going to shit in his own nest by telling us about the conditions and behind the scenes discussions.

The structure of the Olympics means you can lose 3 games in group play and get hot at the right time and win the first knockout game and all of a sudden are playing off for a medal. In the World Cup you don't have that.

The difference in top end talent between teams for World Cups and Olympics isnt great (outside of the US who typically send a better team to the Olympics).

The big factor making the world cup (and euro cup) harder is the overall number. There's about a dozen countries in Europe capable of playing top end elite basketball and at the World Cup and Euros there's just more of them so more chances one or more of them are clicking. Thats why they're harder.

Cram, you cannot lose 3 games in group play at the Olympics and remain alive. If you lose all 3 games you finish 4th in the group and that is your Olympic campaign over.

"Thinking about this, Argentina made a world cup final with their centre being a 39 year old, 6 foot 9 Luis Scola"

Hell, at this stage maybe we should be giving Bogut a call! Scola was still a very effective, very sly interior presence offensively, and old-man strength and wisdom defensively. Argentina also had a functional offense with some shooters. We have a ton of good slashers, but we need someone inside, and some outside shooters, to shift the defense. At this stage, we have nobody inside and our best outside shooter has been Thybulle.

The promising sign is that the defense can be stifling at times. Although I suspect that will mostly affect the weaker teams. We have still been able to put points up, somehow. But unlike previous campaigns where we had some bad warm-up games, this time we don't have someone like Bogut to inject into the lineup to be that missing piece to a well thought-out offensive system. Do we have any offensive system, apart from give the ball to Giddey? Defensively, we are a donut. Hopefully Goorj is working on pick and roll defense.

Not too worried offensively. They've not run structure really and I am guessing they're holding it all back until the real stuff. Defending the interior is my concern. I have no doubt the shots will eventually drop

The World Cup is obviously tougher than the Olympics. I don't think anyone seriously has Iran, who played in Tokyo, in the Top 12 teams in the world.

2019 First Round - Argentina vs Russia vs Nigeria vs Korea

2023 First Round - Aus vs Germany vs Finland vs Japan

2019 Second Round - Argentina vs Poland and Venezuela

2023 Second Round - Aus vs Slovenia and Cape verde or Georgia or Venezuela

If 2023 Boomers had been in the 2019 Argentina group, I wouldn't have worried about a first-round exit.

Ok yeah I forgot they changed it for Tokyo.

But even still, 8 out of 12 qualify for quarter finals. Teams that went 1-2 make the quarters.

If we go 1-2 in our group at the Worlds, we will not advance.

We can only feasibly afford to lose one game in either the first or second round and make it to the quarters. Shame we couldn't start the campaign against Japan it would give us more time to sort ourselves out.

"But even still, 8 out of 12 qualify for quarter finals."

The teams that get there - with 1 exception from Asia & Africa - are the very best teams from the WC and the OQT, so you're playing more of the best right from the first moment of the tournament. Those teams are split across 8 groups at the start of the WC.

If Goulding doesn't make it to the warm-up game in Japan, I will be very upset with the decision not to take 13 players.

So the bigs rotation will pretty much the same as Olympics with Duop taking Jocks minutes, plenty of Thybulle at 4 and sprinkling in some white and cooks

@ Yup correct

Tokyo minutes across 6 games:

Kay - 167
Landale - 131
Baynes - 29 (Played first 2 games only)
Reath - 17 (only played in 4 games. Didn't play Bronze game vs Slovenia)

So only 344 of a possible 480 minutes in the 4 and 5 spots played by actual 4's and 5's. Or 72% of available minutes.

This time we'll have Reath, Kay, Cooks and White as genuine 4 and 5 men, and quite likely we'll again play small ball with Ingles/Thybulle at the 4

A lot hinges on Reath, but I've liked what I've seen so far across Illawarra and the Boomers. He needs to bring his best vs world-class opposition. But he looks capable of that.

"so you're playing more of the best right from the first moment of the tournament."

Re: Olympics vs World Cup, also consider that the "best" you refer to is a year out of date. Injuries, unavailabilities, form all matter. Let's face it, most of the best teams are in Europe. The World Cup has far more of them competing. The World Cup has more games prior to the quarters to weed out the weaker teams. The World Cup has more strong teams and more opportunities for form to be rewarded out of that larger pool of talented teams. There is also the added factor of more games, so depth of each team matters. World Cup is way tougher.

Well each competition is a unique proposition but being that the world cup has more games, you have more chances to be found out and are probably less likely to Bradbury yourself a medal. You also have to be fairly deep in your roster or you run the risk of burning your main guys out. That's a bit less likely in the Olympics. I think we learned a lesson in 2019 when we burned our main 7 to the ground and by the time the bronze medal game was on, you couldn't get that energy into the main guys. Now we run the risk of doing that again if Goorjian doesn't dip deep into his rotation. To play the style of game they want to play, theyre going to need constant rotation of fresh bodies and the talent is there to do that. He talks about having a "main 8". Right now, he needs a "main 12". By I digress... More games, more European talent, equals a tougher competition I'd think

Jock has given an update on his socials. Out but 'not a too serious injury'.

Goorjian on ch 9 implied that he was taking the approach that Landale wouldn't play in the WC, rather than that Landale wouldn’t play in the WC.

In other words, he’s planning for absence but not discounting Landale’s return. Positive signs?

Landale is definitely out. He has confirmed it on his social media.

:(

4-6 weeks out.

Just really thinking about our situation. I was looking at some photos of our team on court. And let's not understate losing Jock - it's a blow. But come on... our bench right now is better than most teams starting 5s. We have more length and athleticism than anyone not named USA or Canada. We're going to be able to switch positions and roles seamlessly. There is still a lot to like about this team. It is still an improvement on the 2021 Bronze team I'd still suggest. Let's not give up on the boys...

Complete rosters

Australia
Xavier Cooks, Dyson Daniels, Dante Exum, Josh Giddey, Chris Goulding, Josh Green, Joe Ingles, Nick Kay, Patty Mills, Duop Reath, Matisse Thybulle, Jack White

France
Nicolas Batum, Nando De Colo, Isaïa Cordinier, Moustapha Fall, Evan Fournier, Sylvain Francisco, Rudy Gobert, Mathias Lessort, Elie Okobo, Yakuba Ouattara, Terry Tarpey, Guerschon Yabusele.

Georgia
Rati Andronikashvil, Sandro Mamukelashvili, Kakhaber Jintcharadze, Luka Liklikadze, Giorgi Tsintsadze, Giorgi Shermadini, Duda Sanadze, Giorgi Turdziladze, Mikheil Berishvili, Tornike Shengelia, Thaddus McFadden, Goga Bitadze

Germany
Isaac Bonga, Franz Wagner, Niels Giffey, Justus Hollatz, Moritz Wagner, David Kramer, Johannes Voigtmann, Maodo Lo, Andreas Obst, Dennis Schroder, Daniel Theis, Johannes Thiemann

Italy
Luigi Datome, Mouhamet Diouf, Simone Fontecchio, Nicolo Melli, Alessandro Pajola, Achille Polonara, Gabriele Procida, Giampaolo Ricci, Luca Severini, Matteo Spagnolo, Marco Spissu, Stefano Tonut.

Lithuania
Eimantas Bendzius, Ignas Brazdeikis, Rokas Jokubaitis, Vaidas Kariniauskas, Mindaugas Kuzminskas, Gabrielius Maldunas, Donatas Motiejunas, Margiris Normantas, Tadas Sedekerskis, Deividas Sirvydis, Jonas Valanciunas, Tomas Dimsa

Slovenia
Ziga Samar, Aleksej Nikolic, Klemen Prepelic, Mike Tobey, Jaka Blazic, Gregor Hrovat, Ziga Dimec, Zoran Dragic, Bine Prepelic, Gregor Glas, Jokib Cebasek, Luka Doncic

USA
Paolo Banchero, Mikal Bridges, Jalen Brunson, Anthony Edwards, Tyrese Haliburton, Josh Hart, Brandon Ingram, Jaren Jackson Jr. Cam Johnson, Walker Kessler, Bobby Portis, Austin Reaves

I was looking at a photo just now, and it's of Matisse Thybulle, Dante Exum, Xavier Cooks, Dyson Daniels and Jack White. It dawned on me, that's 5 NBA players. Two of those players are unlikely to see court time. That's your second unit. That's not even your first sixth man. An NBL MVP among them. An NBA player and Duke captain that was almost cut. One of the NBA's best defenders. A top 10 draft pick. That's our BENCH. You could argue that that would be among our greatest starting 5s on resumes alone. That's our bench.

Let's not throw the baby out with the bath water. This team will have challenges and they've played ugly basketball so far. But there's a lot of upside here.

Just because you have an NBA contract doesn't mean you are the best of the best. Plenty of role players getting a pay cheque in the the NBA. I love Jack White but he didn't even play most of last year. Hell Patty only got into 40 games at the Nets for 14 mpg. We might have "NBA" players but there is nba and then there is "NBA"

You have to be of a certain standard to make the NBA that's just a fact. And while you can say some NBA players are better than others, there's a reason one guy is in the NBA and another isn't.

Delly played in the NBA last season thanks to his relationship with Mike Brown at the Cavs. We saw how mediocre Delly was in the NBL the year before that.

Thon Maker a guy who didn't survive the first batch of cuts for the Boomers played five years in the NBA. Then went to Israel and averaged 2 ppg before he was released.

What I am saying is our bench is pretty good and in any other era they'd all be starters.

After the US Australia would have the most nba players, we are still strong. Fiba rules and court sizes are different but we should still do well.

I like your optimism, but a vital point in the major international tournaments is team chemistry and experience playing together under the same system. Daniels, White and Cooks are international rookies with barely a couple weeks Boomers experience.

Just watched the Sudan game, I'm thinking the main rotation is...

Giddey/Exum
Mills/CG
Green/Ingles
Kay/Matysse
Duop/Kay

Daniels, White, Cooks spot minutes…

Green is looking beastly, I’m tipping a coming out party and our 3 man for the next decade!

I think team chemistry/system will be fine. We don't that many "rookies".

Cooks isn't a rookie, he was one of the last cuts of the Olympic team. Daniels/White probably won't play much at all, and White played a significant amount of games under Goorjian during the World Cup Qualifiers.

Compared to other teams, the experience of Mills, Ingles, Kay, Goulding is superior.

Look at the US, Canada haven't had most of their NBA guys together like this before. I don't think Germany have had the Wagner brothers play in a major tournament before. We aren't an outlier in terms of experience.

Think it might be

Giddey / Exum / Daniels
Mills / Ingles / Goulding
Green / Thybulle
Kay / White
Reath / Cooks


Could see them moving thybullle or white into s5

If you move Patty and Kay to the bench, you'll have a really good team.

Dominican Republic upset Canada

Atm usa and Germany look to have the most cohesion.

Gee you better tell Goorj that Patty Goat. He probably hasn't thought of that

Dominican Republic vs Puerto Rico (86-93) Dominican Republic defeat

Dominican Republic vs Latvia (69-74) Dominican Republic defeat

Dominican Republic vs Canada (94-88) Dominican Republic win

Karl Towns has been playing since the game against Canada.
Karl Towns smashed the inside of Canada and the Dominican Republic won.
Canada has about 10 NBA players, and the Dominican Republic has none besides Towns and two-way signee Quinones.
Think about Boomers loss to Brazil, when the inside is broken, the outside is broken.
The foundation of FIBA Ball is the Big ball. You can't win simply because you have a lot of NBA players. Eventually, we need to find a solution to our interior defense.

Goorjian will need to carefully manage Reath's minutes so that he doesn’t get injured or cooked through over-playing. It will hurt us a lot to rest him, but it will hurt us more if he’s injured or cooked through playing him too much.

Our other bigs are good and will work hard, but are a bit of a distance behind him.

"Eventually, we need to find a solution to our interior defense."

It's the variation of ball-screen defence depending on the situation that we need to get right. That's what hurt us most against Brazil. I dare say Goorj didn't want to show too much that night, but they need to be able to show mulitple looks at teams.

Yeah look we get it Patty, big men are big. You're a basketball genius and the first person to notice this.

(We'll ignore Canada not playing any of their starters more than 15 minutes in that game. And that half of KAT's points came from the outside because that's how he plays. And that Canada start two genuine bigs but apparently couldn't stop KAT anyway.)

Playing time? Even though Canada distributed the playing time, their depth is better than the Dominican Republic. Look at the practice game that the Dominican Republic played earlier.

You're right that Towns's scoring has been based around the perimeter, and he hasn't scored much inside, but every time he gets the ball inside, Canada is forced to play help defense, which throws them off balance on the outside.

This is a practice game, teams shouldn't have all their cards out, which is why winning or losing is irrelevant.
It's about building the team's organization and making sure that any deficiencies are corrected in the real thing.

A question, why aren't you Boomers coach Patty? You seem to know everything!

I agree on managing Reath. You're going to get some interesting line ups. You'll see Kay or Cooks at the 5 a bit. I think you'll also see line ups where you've got Kay, Cooks and potentially even White on the court at the same time. I think we'll have some capacity to combat the bigman problem but the issue I don't love is that we can't really go big at all. It's basically small ball, or slightly less than small ball. I think the team is going to have to go 12 deep and rotate a lot to play the kind of game we need to play to medal. It's just lucky that there isn't a big drop off between our starters and bench. We are also lucky the players we do have are very athletic and agile. You can negate size with athleticism to a great extent when it comes to any 1 on 1 battle. I'd like to see White get some tough big man assignments. He's a problem for the saying "white men can't jump" lol

We are trying to find reasons to be hopeful

One start would be Patty and Ingles getting back to what they're best at: performing when it counts.

Are you being sarcastic?
I never dismissed anyone's opinion or said that my opinion was necessarily the correct one.
Please look up my other comments.
I initially expected White to be cut, but many people said that White was a better piece than Cooks, and I accepted that.
I'm even one who thinks White should be a starter now.

Defense and Transitions
It's better to play to our strengths by playing more players rather than having a core group of players play long minutes.
In the scrimmages, Daniels hasn't been a presence, but if we use our strengths, he can help even in small minutes.
We don't have a real Center, but we have a lot of forwards who are long and quick and play good team defense.
I think the overall player shooting issue will be resolved over time.
Hopefully we're injury free now because it hurts.

We really have no choice but to play mostly small ball. We're not having to reinvent the wheel here, it's been done before. I think it bares mentioning as well that Australia was one of the top 3 offensive rebounding teams at the last Olympics. We were relatively small then too. Of course Jock is now gone and I am not going to miniize that but we've replaced Jock, Kay and Reath, with an upgraded Reath, Kay, Cooks and White. We also have the luxury of some pretty good rebounding guards.

I am not saying all this just to try to be hopeful. I think there's reason for optimism. I think we've overcome some pretty big and bad injuries and outs in our recent history. I also think we have a whole lot of talent and ability. I'd rather ask "how can we do it?" rather than just assume we absolutely cant.

Big test tomorrow against France but not sure how much we will be able to take from a result. Neither team will be showing its full hand but it would be encouraging if we see some signs of negating Gobert, even if only for patches.

Tomorrow is the day Exum and Yabusele meet.

Jack White guarding Gobert ... I'd like to see that. White might be shorter and less experienced, but I think his physicality and tenacity could get under Gobert’s skin a bit.

Kay will get a fair bit of time at the 5. Did the same in the Olympics. Cooks and White will need to step up. Hopefully the coaching staff have a few tricks up their sleeve

Kay will get a fair bit of time at the 5. Did the same in the Olympics. Cooks and White will need to step up. Hopefully the coaching staff have a few tricks up their sleeve

I just noticed on the player list release.

Xavier Cooks is listed at 183 pounds... in comparison Patty Mills is listed at 180 bounds.

Nick Kay is 237 pounds and Jack White 225 pounds.

Cooks will genuinely be fighting about 20kg+ up in weight against some Centre's. Crazy.

The biggest problem with Landale missing is that Reath is quite literally a traffic cone defensively. Brazil absolutely cooked him.

"Xavier Cooks is listed at 183 pounds" when he was 16?

At Winthrop he was a skinny 180, he above 200

There are a few key games where size is going to be a question mark - Germany - any quarterfinal with either Spain or France. While Canada will be very good, they don't have that dominant big man presence. We may well hope to match with them.

After the Quarterfinals, if we are so lucky... we have one of likely Italy, Serbia or USA in the Semis. If we finish top of everything to that point, we hypothetically should duck Team USA>

I may be wrong but I am not aware of any of those teams being particularly 'big'. Feel free to correct me.

So really, the big bad question mark is the quarterfinal game. We hypothetically could drop a game to Germany (heaven forbid) and still come through the rest of the way to medal rounds. That's obviously not the path you'd want to take but it is a path.

What constitutes a dominant big It's all in the perception of the person.
It's only a scrimmage, but I don't think anyone expected the Boomers to get crushed inside by Caboclo. He's 6'9. (His wingspan is 7'7, but...)
There may not be an dominant big man, but a big against Boomers could be an dominant big.

There are some injury concerns around Sergio Llull and Alberto Diaz for Spain as a side note - everyone's going through it.

"but I don't think anyone expected the Boomers to get crushed inside by Caboclo."

Depends on a lot of things, including what were the Boomers aiming to get out of the game? They may not have had any real concern for him or the inside play and wanted to work on something else. We do not know. What we do know is warm up games often play out much differently to the real thing, and I am sure the Boomers coaching staff are very aware that there is a hole in the middle that needs plugging.

If we'd have pressed Brazil the full game it’s a completely different story so who cares about Bruno who was the draftee "who’s 2 years from being 2 years away"

Yes, nothing is certain right now. It's not too late to watch and evaluate the warm-up game against France.

There will be cat and mouse games played against France as they know that France is a potential quarterfinal match up. I'd like to see them play something that is a bit more reminiscent of Boomers Basketball but they'll be keeping cards close to their chest on a lot of thigns so dont expect to see all the clear signs of how things are from that game either.

I agree. You can hide a lot of cards and you can test the strategic, tactical part of what we should be doing and we can check the basic things like man-to-man defense, shooting, etc.

At some point you actually need to get experience into your actual gameplay though and just play properly

Yeah, you do. But you also have to be mindful that there's a 1 in 3 chance this is your quarterfinal opponent. Both teams will have things left in the playbook. But certainly I expect and want to see some encouraging things here.

This makes sense, too.
There are only two scrimmages left, and Georgia is not a powerhouse, so there's no point in playing them well, it's just a final check.
If I had to say at what point, I would say it's today. We could meet France in the quarterfinals, but we'd rather get through the first and second rounds than that.

And momentum is important.
France hasn't lost a practice game at this point and is the favorite, so even if practice games don't mean much, a win over a powerhouse like France would be a positive for the team.

Means nothing