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The State of Professional Basketball in
Britain by Phil Ariss Professional basketball in Britain has been a constant battle to get media attention with other professional sports in the country. With soccer, rugby (league and union) and cricket as the team sports leading the media's attention, attendance's, revenue and sponsorship, basketball is always going to struggle with these developed sports that attract such a huge cult following. Along with basketball there are other minority professional sports looking for attention, such as ice-hockey, which at present brings more people into the arenas than basketball. With these in mind Basketball in Britain is looking promising for the future, but at present, is struggling financially. The owners of the clubs are ambitious and attracting an audience is becoming increasingly difficult. Take Manchester Giants for instance, they play their games at the MEN arena, which would not look out of place alongside the Staples Centre or any other arena that a NBA team graces. At one stage, the franchise attracted 11,000 people to see the final game of the season against the Sheffield Sharks to determine who was to be crowned league champions. Like all crucial games, it went down to the wire, with 6 seconds left on the clock, Terrell Myers hit a buzzer beater to stun the crowd and give the Sharks the title. This was the perfect setting for the league to explode with media attention and bring the game to a level of recognition it deserves. This was not to be. Two seasons past and the Giants franchise was sold, attendance's fell and so did the teams performances. The club was on a tight salary cap and failed to recruit quality players to repeat the clubs previous success. Manchester was not the only team with serious finical trouble, their rivals Sheffield were also in trouble with their owners not paying wages to their other ventures in soccer. On a brighter side, there are a lot of good things going for British Basketball, TV company's actually want the sport, with the rights to show live games looking to go to a even higher bidder for the 2001 - 2002 season. BBL clubs are starting to compete with the top European clubs, London Towers leading the way with some convincing wins against tough opposition. As for players in the league, well, this seems the most promising aspect. With NBA player John Amechi playing his trade with Sheffield not too long ago, and ex-NBA player Loren Meyer who will no doubt return in the near future, claiming the league MVP award, it is obvious that talent is not a problem. The biggest criticism of the league is the amount of British players playing in the league. With each club allowed 5 import players (generally each teams starting 5) there seems to be no place for the British players. This can be improved on with ambitious franchises that have the financial backing, such franchises include the London Towers, who have on their roster Steve Bucknall who played his trade with the L.A. Lakers after attending UNC. Alongside Steve are other England internationals that make the Towers probably the best team in the BBL. There is plenty of British talent, but the problem lies with money. The good British players can earn more money playing in Europe than in their own country, while the lesser players are restricted to poor wages to make room for the import players. Such British players include Andy Betts, who was drafted by Charlotte in the second round of the NBA draft. He now plays in the strong leagues of Europe earning huge amounts of money that rivals that of soccer players in his own country, except, when he returns home, he is unrecognised. The BBL www.bbl.org.uk has a lot of things to work on, but the game is too exciting to go unnoticed by the public. Lets hope in 20 years time that all BBL clubs have arenas the size of the MEN attracting attendance's of 17,000, and that basketball rivals soccer for back page news. Lets hope. |
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