Paris 2024 Olympics. Led by Wembanyama, the French basketball team gets its preparations for the Games off to a perfect start against Turkey

Victor Wembanyama a porté la France face à la Turquie. FFBB – armand lenoir

L’équipe de France de basket a parfaitement commencé sa préparation lors de son premier match face à la Turquie, mercredi 3 juillet à Rouen.

The French basketball team began its preparation for the Olympic Games with a demonstration against Turkey (96-46) on Wednesday in Rouen, led by Victor Wembanyama, already sparkling. In attack and defense, "Wemby" dominated (24 points, 6 rebounds, 4 assists), meeting the expectations of the Blues and Kindarena management, packed for the occasion (5,467 spectators), and establishing himself as THE star of the team.

Of course, this individual performance, like the fine collective performance delivered by France, must be put into perspective to the extent that the Turks played this meeting without their three best players: Alperen Sengun, Cedi Osman and Furkan Korkmaz.

Wemby is about 3 years away from being the best player in the world

pic.twitter.com/ScDAJjx4L4

— Hoop Herald (@TheHoopHerald) July 4, 2024

But this performance brings hope. Firstly because the Blues responded, overall, to the main expectation of their coach Vincent Collet, by defending the lead. The Norman intends to make his team the best defense in the Olympic tournament, relying on the exceptional qualities in this area of ​​his two interiors Rudy Gobert (elected best defender in the NBA four times) and Wembanyama.

Vincent Collet was delighted with this first defensive try, but also with the speed driven by his players: "This evening, c& rsquo;was a first step. In our identity, there is also the recovery, we scored 43 points in this sector."

Main flat: "Our setups are sometimes too slow, and against teams that are harder to play, that’s a real problem", he noted. The two giants, 2.16 m for Gobert, 2.24 m for Wembanyama, started this first preparation match together, forming a racket which peaked at 2.20 m on average. Above all, they managed to play together, "Wemby" finding "Rudy" on several occasions for easy points, like the one that opened the Blues festival.

Strazel, Ntilikina and Coulibaly show up

This match served as a laboratory of experiments for Vincent Collet, who lined up several different fives, starting with Matthew Strazel, Isaïa Cordinier, Bilal Coulibaly (who was playing his first match with the selection) and the two interiors. Very dominant in the racket and stifling in defense, especially on the outside lines, this five gave way to Théo Maledon, Nadir Hifi, Evan Fournier, Guerschon Yabusele and Mathias Lessort.

After a first quarter dominated by the French (26-14), a third major five was tested: Frank Ntilikina, Nando de Colo, Élie Okobo, captain Nicolas Batum and Wembanyama , this time at the pivot position. It was in this suit that the twenty-year-old scored, showcasing his unique combination of size, mobility and technical palette. His teammates have searched for him a lot in the air, where he is a threat to every defense in the world, often finding him above Turks with no solution.

From 46-26 at halftime, the score swelled further in the second half. Despite some messy passages understandable for a first match, this meeting allowed several players to show themselves: the leader Matthew Strazel undoubtedly scored points in his ability to defend with enormous intensity and rsquo; organize the attack, just like Frank Ntilikina in this position and Coulibaly on the wing, sometimes blocker, sometimes finisher. Adversity will rise several notches on Saturday in Cologne, where the French team will face Germany, the world champion.