EuroBasket 2011 to be played with 24 teams

[TalkBasket]

Exactly. The teams were giving their 100% in order to qualify and now those teams that finished lower still qualified. It is unfair. The reason behind expanding Eurobasket to 24 teams already in 2011 was very simple - Lithuania's closest neighbours failed to qualify and that meant a loss of potentially large fan groups arriving. That means less tickets sold and less income to the host country.



By the way, Lithuanian Basketball Federation will cover all the costs of accommodation for only 15 teams that qualified first. Other teams will have to pay for themselves.



23 teams are already known:



Lithuania, Spain, Serbia, Greece, Slovenia, France, Croatia, Germany, Russia, Turkey, Great Britain, Belgium, Montenegro, FYR of Macedonia, Israel.



These teams were given spots due to expansion of the tournament: Italy, Latvia, Ukraine, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Georgia, Bulgaria, Poland.



Finland, Portugal and Hungary will play in AQT for the last spot.



The system of the tournament will be four groups with 6 teams in each. Top three teams from each group will qualify for the second round which will be the same as in previous years.



It's likely that we'll have three clear favourites and three underdogs in each group.