Tough draw for Tall Blacks

The Tall Blacks will play European powerhouse Greece, Montenegro and Brazil in Group F at the FIBA World Cup basketball tournament in China this year.

The draw was made in China yesterday with New Zealand’s games to be hosted in Nanjing.

New Zealand are ranked 38th in the world, Greece are eighth, Brazil 12th and Montenegro 28th.

Greece topped a supergroup including Serbia and Germany in the World Cup qualifiers. World Cup finals first-timers Montenegro had seven wins and five losses in finishing third in their European group and South American superstars Brazil qualified with nine wins and three losses from the Americas’ Group F.

Far from fearing the draw, Tall Blacks head coach Paul Henare welcomed the challenge of a fifth consecutive World Cup for his team, and the prospect of continuing a run that has seen the Tall Blacks alongside world powers the USA, Argentina, Serbia and Spain as the only teams over the past four tournaments to qualify for knockout play.

‘‘This is always an exciting part of the journey to a World Cup, to finally find out who we will play and begin to put our plans in place,’’ Henare said.

‘‘Obviously it will be tough, it should be and will be, that is basketball. Our world ranking consistently puts us in amongst the world’s best teams, but basketball is one of the true global sports, with anyone in the top 50 or 60 capable of beating a top 10 team.’’

‘‘Greece and Brazil will be the obvious favourites in the pool, but Montenegro [ Serbia] is also a proud basketball nation, we will get to work on some plans on how to achieve success against them all.

‘‘My job now, with the coaching and support staff, is to pull together a preparation that will give us a shot of playing to our potential.’’