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EuroBasket Blog: Ben Gordon

On a cool, late Summer’s evening in 2010, near the famous Albert Dock in Liverpool, Detroit Pistons’ guard Ben Gordon was given Great Britain’s number four jersey.

Clad in British Basketball warm-up gear, Gordon said he was ‘excited’ to play for Great Britain on the night they qualified for EuroBasket, with a dramatic victory over Bosnia & Herzegovina. This win pretty much solidified their spot at the London 2012 Olympics.

“I’m definitely on board to play for Great Britain [but] this summer to me was about getting situated and moving from Chicago to Detroit,” said Gordon.

“I didn’t want to make a commitment as far as when I was going to play until I felt I was totally committed to that cause.

“I wanted to have everything in order in my life before going overseas and representing the country,” Gordon told Hoopshype.com last year.

GB fans inside the Liverpool Echo Arena were naturally pumped-up and thrilled at being able to see another NBA star put on the Great Britain uniform, and to add, have a realistic chance of winning a medal at EuroBasket. Heck, why not?

But there were some other Team GB fans in Liverpool, that were not sharing that viewpoint. Saying that they won’t believe it until they see it.

Fans that couldn’t make it to Liverpool were split down the middle – half celebrated – the other half decided to sit on the fence.

At the end of the day though, who can blame them for not believing Ben Gordon’s comments? His pledge was many years in the making, and these fans were made to sweat over his decision. He was rumoured to be included in the Great Britain team for EuroBasket 2009 in Poland. That rumour was nothing more than a Chinese whisper.

His inclusion into coach Chris Finch’s squad for the upcoming Olympic Test Event and EuroBasket was unknown, until news broke that Ben Gordon’s wife was pregnant and was expecting the baby during the Summer period. Gordon’s involvement in the two events is now 50/50.

Your job should never, ever get in the way of becoming a proud daddy. That takes top priority and many congratulations to the Gordon family on the news.

One comment on Twitter stated that: “You really couldn’t make this up if you tried,” and the rest of the comments on the social-networking site were in the same vein. 

Some even tweeted that ‘He won’t play for GB ever.’

If he indeed misses EuroBasket and the Olympic Test Event in London because of the birth of his child, then Great Britain fans will have to understand that family takes priority over basketball, Gordon though will have to come to terms with the fact that some of the British basketball fraternity aren’t too sure if they can trust his pro-GB commitment comments, at the moment. 

I would like to think that Ben Gordon will be wearing the Adidas white and blue of Great Britain. But, for now, the Detroit Piston will have his critics, and I’m sure they would love to be proved wrong. 

Liverpool was most certainly a long time ago now.

John Hobbs for TalkBasket.net

Follow John on Twitter @johnswisshobbs

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