The EuroLeague "approved a calendar in which there will be no free dates for FIBA windows," according to Juanma Rubio of AS. This means that EuroLeague teams "will not release players for national team games, but they also cannot prevent them from playing for their national teams if they are called to play." It "will be the players themselves who will have to decide." In Spain, the Sports Law "obligates them to play for the national team." There will be two windows during the next EuroLeague season -- in November and February -- when national teams will have qualifiers for the 2019 FIBA World Cup. Spain will face Montenegro on Nov. 24 and Slovenia on Nov. 26. The NBA "already said that it will not release players during its season" (AS, 7/6). In Madrid, Álex Biescas reported "the confrontation between FIBA and the EuroLeague over the calendar is clear and has no signs of being resolved in a simple fashion or in the short term." EuroLeague President Jordi Bertomeu said, "All the clubs and leagues present at the assembly approved the calendar. What we did was confirm the same agreement that we reached two years ago, when the FIBA windows were discussed. ... We cannot interrupt the calendar and this is the reality, there is no other possibility. We have had the same calendar since 15 years ago" (AS, 7/6).
FIBA REACTS: FIBA said in a statement that it is disappointed that the '17-18 EuroLeague calendar does not include the windows for national team competition in November and February. The organization added, "We were assured by ECA [Euroleague Commercial Assets] -- in a letter signed on 10 November 2016 -- that 'ECA rules do not prevent or limit in any way the release of players to national teams competitions.' Consequently, today's decision clearly passes the responsibility for deciding whether or not to play for their national teams to the players themselves. This unnecessarily creates the potential for conflict between clubs on the one hand, and players and national federations on the other. ... FIBA wishes to highlight key facts that led to a situation which ECA could have easily avoided:
• The new FIBA calendar was approved unanimously by all national federations in 2014, reducing the workload of players by an average of 26% through the elimination of one Continental Cup every 4 years;
• The exact dates of the national team windows were published in August 2015, more than 2 years before their implementation; ...
• ECA discarded the idea to start Euroleague one week earlier in October 2017 and to introduce only one more double-header in the season, which would have accommodated the national team windows" (FIBA).
