‘All sorts of problems’: Boomers cop pre-World Cup wake-up call as lower-ranked rival stuns hosts
Australia has copped a shock loss in its FIBA World Cup build-up, falling to world No.13 Brazil 86-90 on Wednesday night in Melbourne.
While the Boomers dominated Seventeenth-ranked Venezuela of their opening warm-up match 97-41, they struggled early and sometimes in opposition to their fellow South American facet.
Brazil led comfortably on the first break and held a 43-41 edge at halftime because the Boomers steadied, however by no means took a dominant lead, permitting the guests to combat again and regain the lead halfway by the fourth quarter.
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Helped by some unbelievable accuracy from three-point vary, Brazil held on from there, even after Joe Ingles made a trio of free throws to chop the margin again to 2 with half a minute to play.
Australia in-bounded with 20 seconds left however took nearly half of that point to throw up a determined Josh Giddey three which simply missed.
“This is really good and testing for them – a good test for what’s ahead,” Aussie basketball nice Andrew Gaze stated on commentary.
“They are having all sorts of problems defending the on-ball screen.”
Coach Brian Goorjan should nonetheless make another reduce from the 13-man squad with Xavier Cooks and Jack White seen as the lads on the bubble.
The Boomers will face South Sudan in Melbourne on Thursday evening earlier than ending their tune-ups in opposition to France and Georgia.
As for the World Cup motion itself, the Boomers are a part of Group E and can play Finland of their first official recreation to kick off the event.
That recreation is scheduled for 6pm AEST on Friday, August 25. Australia can be scheduled to face Germany (6.30pm, August 27) and Japan (9.10pm, August 29) to spherical out the group stage.
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CURRENT BOOMERS SQUAD
Xavier Cooks, Dyson Daniels, Dante Exum, Josh Giddey, Chris Goulding, Josh Green, Joe Ingles, Nick Kay, Jock Landale (*injured), Patty Mills, Duop Reath, Matisse Thybulle, Jack White
FULL FIBA WORLD CUP WARM-UP SCHEDULE (Times AEST)
Australia def Venezuela 97-41
Brazil def Australia 90-86
Australia vs South Sudan (Thursday, August 17 @ 7.45pm)
Australia vs France (Sunday, August 20 @ 2pm)
Australia vs Georgia (Tuesday, August 22 @ TBD)
