Boomers "ugly but necessary" World Cup step

The Boomers entered the 2023 FIBA World Cup with dreams of another medal to follow the success at the Tokyo Olympics. Instead, a disappointing second round exit at the hands of Slovenia led to an eventual tenth-place finish.

The memories of Australia’s rose gold triumph in 2021 still live fresh in the memory, and as the Boomers being their search for the second Olympic medal in the program’s history, Matisse Thybulle has labelled last year’s World Cup disappointment as “a necessary but ugly step in the process” of the team’s improvement.

Thybulle was a cornerstone of Australia’s Olympic medal-winning side in Tokyo, and looks set to once again be the nation’s point of attack defender in Paris, and he says the World Cup disappointment was just another step to the path of Olympic glory.

“When you have as many new players as we have and are transitioning away from a style of play that has been there for the last 12-15 years, it’s going to be uncomfortable,” Thybulle told ESPN.

“The World Cup was our chance to see how things looked and feel it out because, on paper, you’re always going to have something that’s a little bit different from what you put into practice.

“The World Cup was unfortunate and disappointing; it will have been an extremely valuable step to us being able to do what we want in the Olympics.”

Before Australia even gets to Paris though the roster is set to face a litmus test of China, the USA and Serbia in order to sharpen the side ahead of the Olympic campaign.

The Boomers will first clash with China in Melbourne before they tackle the two-headed monster of Serbia and the USA on back-to-back days in Abu Dhabi.

While Australia has named a 22-man extended roster that features the likes of NBL talents Will Magnay, Jack McVeigh and Sam Froling, the USA has already named the 12-man roster it will be taking to the Olympics – and it’s being labelled as arguably the greatest international basketball team since the 1992 Dream Team.

Thybulle says the strength of America’s squad indicates how rapidly international basketball is improving.

“You want to have a sense of where you stack up. We can only do so much in our intra-squad scrimmages, and the next step after that is to find the best competition around the world to sharpen your iron against,’ he said.

“Being able to go to Abu Dhabi and be able to play Serbia and Team USA, and see how you stack up as a team against the best players in the world is what allows you to finetune the stuff you need to work on right before the games get going.

“I take it as the team they sent to the last Olympics versus the team they’re sending this time around, it shows they have a real fear of not being able to compete.

“For them to put together what’s going to be a historic roster of Hall of Fame players to compete against the rest of the world, I think, is a compliment and a testament to just how good teams are getting. For us, we’re just up for the challenge.”