{"id":751669,"date":"2026-06-21T22:44:12","date_gmt":"2026-06-21T22:44:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/751669\/"},"modified":"2026-06-21T22:44:12","modified_gmt":"2026-06-21T22:44:12","slug":"israel-basketball-begins-camp-for-key-world-cup-qualifiers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/751669\/","title":{"rendered":"Israel basketball begins camp for key World Cup qualifiers"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Israel National Basketball team<\/a> opened up training camp ahead of the final two games of the first round of 2027 World Cup<\/a> qualifying against Germany and Croatia next week.<\/p>\n

The blue-and-white has already secured qualification for the second round as it is 2-2 in Group E, which also includes Cyprus, whom it defeated twice back in February and March. However, the pair of games are still important because the results from the first round will carry over to the next stage of play.<\/p>\n

Israel will host Germany in Latvia due to the ongoing security situation in the Holy Land and will then travel to Osijek to tip off against Croatia. Head coach Ariel Beit Halachmi will be without a number of players for this round as NBA<\/a> All-Star Deni Avdija was not released by the Portland Trail Blazers, and Ben Saraf, who just completed his rookie season with the Brooklyn Nets, will also not be available for the upcoming contests.<\/p>\n

In addition, there are a number of other national team stalwarts who are injured and will not be part of the squad, which includes 15 players and will be pared down to 14 who will travel to the two qualifiers.<\/p>\n

As camp began at Hadar Yosef in Tel Aviv, Beit Halachmi spoke about his upcoming challenges.<\/p>\n

\"\"Halachmi speaks on team challenges ahead<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have gathered here for the final window of the first stage of the qualifiers. We\u2019ve already advanced from our group, and we\u2019re preparing for two very difficult games against strong national teams. We have a lot of absences for many reasons, there are injuries and NBA players who were not released by their clubs, but I want to focus on the players who are here. There\u2019s nothing we can do about those who aren\u2019t, and we\u2019ll give our players the confidence they need.\u201d<\/p>\n

Benayahu Srur received his first call-up to the national team after a couple of seasons that had been full of injuries, but one area that the squad is lacking is size and physicality, which the big man can provide.<\/p>\n

\u201cBenayahu is one of our strongest big men physically, and we need that in this window because last time we struggled in that area. He was in excellent form but unfortunately suffered a serious injury. We\u2019ll see him in the few practices we have and evaluate how much he can contribute during this window.\u201d<\/p>\n

Israel captain Tomer Ginat had a tough season and had been out injured for a while before returning for the Israeli league playoffs with Hapoel Tel Aviv, but it\u2019s clear that the forward is nowhere near being 100% fit.<\/p>\n

\u201cFrom what we know, his situation is shaky,\u201d Beit Halachmi explained. \u201cYou could see that in the way he was running and playing during the finals series. From his perspective, he\u2019ll do everything he can to be available, and we all know Tomer\u2019s commitment, but it seems he\u2019s highly doubtful.\u201d<\/p>\n

The championship finals series between Hapoel Tel Aviv and Maccabi Tel Aviv has caused several players to miss the start of training camp, including not only Ginat but also Yam Madar, Guy Palatin, and Roman Sorkin. However, despite the absences, Beit Halachmi is content that the game of basketball is still being played due to the conflict that the country has had to endure with the war.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith everything we\u2019ve gone through over the past year, not only in basketball, the fact that we\u2019re still playing is a miracle. But we can\u2019t complain about it; we\u2019ll deal with the situation. If the series doesn\u2019t end on Sunday night, their arrival will be delayed by a few more days, but that\u2019s the reality.\u201d<\/p>\n

Although Israel has already advanced to the next stage, the numerous absences, especially considering that Germany and Croatia are coming into the game with strong rosters, could hurt the team\u2019s qualification chances for the World Cup as the first-round records carry over to the next.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are still many games left to play,\u201d Beit Halachmi said. \u201cYou can\u2019t say after this window that our chances have dropped significantly, but we need to try to collect wins. Even after this window, we have more games ahead, and a lot can happen.\u201d<\/p>\n

Beit Halachmi also went into a bit more detail about Israel\u2019s NBA players \u2013 Avdija, Saraf and Danny Wolf \u2013 not being released to play in this window.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe reasons they are not here are related to the players\u2019 injuries, both in Brooklyn and Portland, and there\u2019s not much we can do about that. We know that Deni and Ben came every time they were able to. I think there\u2019s a pretty high chance we\u2019ll see them in the next window, and I hope we\u2019ll have them available in August.\u201d<\/p>\n

Raz Adam, who tragically passed away in a car accident last month, was an important part of this national team along with Beit Halachmi\u2019s Under-20 squad, including the one that captured the 2019 European Championship.<\/p>\n

\u201cFirst of all, Raz was supposed to be here on the court with us. It\u2019s a tremendous loss, first and foremost for his family, and \u00a0also for Israeli basketball as a whole.\u201d<\/p>\n

See more Israeli sports coverage at www.sportsrabbi.com\/en<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Israel National Basketball team opened up training camp ahead of the final two games of the first…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":751670,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[574],"tags":[64,63,726,180387,590,85],"class_list":["post-751669","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-basketball","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-basketball","tag-israeli-sports","tag-nba","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/751669","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=751669"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/751669\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/751670"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=751669"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=751669"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=751669"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}