Michael
Jordan, Marcin Gortat is that all that you know about basketball?
The most
known basketball association is NBA – National Basketball Association. Our PLK
(Polska liga koszykówki) is not even in ten percent as good as basket league
from America.
BUT now we
should be proud that our basketball players are in final eight at FIBA
Basketball World Cup 2019. Today we won with Russia and we booked ticket to the
Quarter-Finals. Other teams that also confirm their place there are: Argentina,
Serbia and Spain. No one bet on us before tournament. Our team have balance
4-0, so we are undefeated so far. Take a look teams dropped out already:
Tunisia, Turkey, New Zealand, Montenegro, Germany and Canada.
To show you
how big success our team already get, we took part in FIBA tournament 52 years
ago and we were at the fifth place.
Our coach
Mike Taylor selected the best players with polish passport. Our leader Mateusz
Ponitka in last game with Russia scored 14 points, get 9 rebounds and assisted
three times. Also our most experienced player Adam Waczyński does his job. Like
classic shooter he scored record-breaking 18 points.
Now we will
play with Argentina, no matter if we lost or win, it is possible that we will
meet in next round one of the favorites of this competition: Serbia. If we get
luck, we will play against Spain or Italy.
Unfortunately
basketball in our country is not as popular as football. I hope that after this
tournament this will change.
- So, how do you think, why basketball is not popular sport in our country?
- Did you watched at least one of the match polish team?
- Before reading this article did you even know that we have one of the eight best basketball teams in the world? Dou you think that we are able to move further to semifinals?
Sources:
http://www.fiba.basketball/basketballworldcup/2019
http://www.fiba.basketball/basketballworldcup/2019
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ReplyDeleteI believe there're three factors which cause basketball is not that popular here. First is lack of any international success of our team (we were unable to qualify for FIBA World Cup for 44 years straight!). Second, we don't have many charismatic personalities that represent basketball. Many people don't know anyone besides Gortat. Third, we and our parents weren't really interested in basketball due to poor infrastructure. In order to play it you need at least one basket and hard floor to dribble. Unfortunately they were present only at schools and usually not really maintained.
ReplyDeleteNo, I didn't watch any match of polish team, since I don't own a TV and I'm not sure if there's any legal stream on the Internet. I'm also not that interested in sports overall.
Yes, I knew we were able to reach quarterfinals. It was quite a big event and even Google decided to suggest me the news about it.
No, we were unable to move further.
I think that problem may be that basketball and basketball players are not advertised the same way as football and football players. In the other hand, they are not advertised because basketball is not popular in our country so I think that it is the vicious circle. I'm not a fan of basketball so I must admit that I didn't watch even one match of our national team. I heard that we have some success in World Cup Competitions but I didn't know that we are one of the eight best basketball teams.
ReplyDeleteI don't think that I've enough knowledge to say why basketball is not so popular in our country but I'll try to guess.
ReplyDeleteFirstly, I think that maybe there is some clue in our genetics that we weren't so tall and well built humans? I'm only guessing so forgive me, please. Other things I can come up with are factors that were already mentioned in comments like no charismatic person to infect others for example. I remember that once I've watched basketball match with Polish team but it didn't delight me. It's even harder to say if we are able to move to semifinals but I wish them well.
Even though I haven't seen the recent games and nowadays I'm not a fan of the sport, I do recall my passion for the NBA in the 90s, when this league was a product of a quality in its own right; The NBA was the first professionally driven sports league, with proper marketing and an investor-friendly business model. Being widely considered an American sport, it might be one of the main reasons why it is not that popular outside the US - the other one might be the lack of proper funding; the great majority of money invested in sports in Europe goes directly into football, though I do understand the pain as a vivid supporter of Irish gaelic games, virtually unheard of outside of Ireland and Australia.
ReplyDeleteThanks to the success of the national team, the tournament made the news; As I've mentioned before, I'm not a fan of the sport but due to the media coverage I even had a chat about it at work with people equally interested in it as well. I know we were knocked out, but hopefully this experience will benefit next time.
So, how do you think, why basketball is not popular sport in our country?
ReplyDeleteI think that behind the success of basketball in USA stands media & culture. At first we've lack of 'tradition' to play basketball in Poland which leads to fact that community isn't so mainstream. That effects media, who are not pumping their attention to it, advertising is on much lower level than in football and the circle is going around. Also, I think that basketball is much more complicate sport than football and "regular" people are too lazy to get familiar with principles and that's why they didn't find it interesting to watch - they just don't realize how complex some tactics are.
Did you watched at least one of the match polish team?
To be honest I'm not the biggest fan of any ball-related sports so the answer is simple - no.
Before reading this article did you even know that we have one of the eight best basketball teams in the world? Dou you think that we are able to move further to semifinals?
As I mentioned previously - I'm not the fan so I don't have much to say about my prediction. At the other hand I've heard/read somewhere that our team is doing great so somehow it reached me. Anyway, I'm wishing our team best!
It’s hard to say why exactly basketball is not so popular in Poland. Popularity is influenced by many factors and it’s not so easy to reverse the trend I guess. I remember when I was a child and at school we played football quite often and we played basketball only a few times a year, so for sure school has its impact. When I was young it was the most obvious way that we played football after classes and almost none of my friends played basketball then. Unfortunately, I wasn’t watching a match of the polish team. What is more, I wasn’t even aware that the polish team achieved such great success. Perhaps the reason is I don’t watch TV at all and usually I don’t follow the news, etc. It’s comforting to see such great news.
ReplyDeleteSince our primary schools we are being taught that football is the most important sport in our country and in most cases this is the only sport that is being advertised so widely across our country. I think this is the main problem with low popularity of other sports, not only basketball.
ReplyDeleteI'm not fan of any team sports at all, so my answer is "no".
I've never been interested in basketball and other team sports, I wouldn't be even able to guess players in polish football representation or more than two polish football teams. But I think that this information is something good to know, that there is field in sports where we can be proud of having good players. About moving to semifinal etc I'm not able as I'm not fan of such things at all even guess what might happen next.
There are for sure many reasons why basketball is not popular in our country. I think, unfortunately, that money is one of the main ones. I don't recall any great successes of the Polish team or any basketball club from Poland in recent times (except the one mentioned above). Because of that, basketball is not quite popular not only among people, but in media generally and it is people and popularity that cause the inflow of capital. Here we've got a vicious circle: lack of money in -> lack of successes -> lack of popularity -> lack of money out -> and so on and so on. Of course, it can be said that the representation in football also does not achieve success, which is true, but football in our country is already very popular.
ReplyDeletePersonally I don't watch basketball at all, because it gives me absolutely no pleasure. Maybe I just don't understand this sport well enough.
I try to follow the results of Polish national teams in various disciplines at large events, so yes, of course I knew :)
Recently I noticed many people following the basketball world cup, watching the games at night and betting online. It is a new sport for us to follow. I think it’s also popular outside the US. I know in our neighbours Lithuania it’s really popular. To me it’s a very dynamic sport, where you have to focused all the time, but since so many points can be scored, it’s not like in Football that one particular moment can decide the whole game. However I think, that in Poland we have many sports with a longer tradition, allthough during all my years in school it was always the most often selected one during sports classes.
ReplyDelete