Serbian national team will play the Eurobasket 2009 in Poland without Efes Pilsen guard Igor Rakocevic. Top Euroleague scorer decided to rest this summer because of the achilles tendon injury he suffered during the ACB league play-off finals and informed NT coach Dusan Ivkovic of his decision. Experienced point-guard Vule Avdalovic will also miss Eurobasket because of problems with his knee.
Dusan Ivkovic decided to bring in Bojan Popovic to replace Rakocevic and Avdalovic. Duda also called in five youngsters who won tne University games tournament – Nemanja Bjelica, Miroslav Raduljica, Milan Macvan, Ivan Paunic and Marko Keselj. Ivkovic now has 18 candidates for Eurobasket: Milos Teodosic, Stefan Markovic, Milenko Tepic, Uros Tripkovic, Dusan Kecman, Novica Velickovic, Zoran Erceg, Ivan Radenovic, Luka Bogdanovic, Nenad Krstic, Kosta Perovic, Boban Marjanovic, Bojan Popovic, Marko Keselj, Milan Macvan, Miroslav Raduljica, Ivan Paunic and Nemanja Bjelica.
