{"id":35433,"date":"2023-05-05T08:02:49","date_gmt":"2023-05-05T08:02:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/basketball-simmons-keen-to-represent\/"},"modified":"2023-05-05T08:04:30","modified_gmt":"2023-05-05T08:04:30","slug":"basketball-simmons-keen-to-represent","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/basketball-simmons-keen-to-represent\/","title":{"rendered":"Basketball-Simmons keen to represent Australia at World Cup – coach"},"content":{"rendered":"

MELBOURNE (Reuters) – Three-times NBA All-Star Ben Simmons is getting his health back and is a “strong chance” to represent Australia at the World Cup, coach Brian Goorjian said.<\/p>\n

The Brooklyn Nets forward has battled back and knee problems since joining the NBA side in 2021\/22, and cut his season short to recuperate.<\/p>\n

Simmons has repeatedly pulled out of playing major tournaments for Australia, including the Boomers’ bronze medal-winning Olympics in Tokyo.<\/p>\n

However, Goorjian said Simmons now wanted to be in the national setup for the August-September World Cup in Philippines, Japan and Indonesia.<\/p>\n

“It just didn\u2019t work (in the past), but now he is in a situation where he is getting his health back to be ready to play,” Goorjian told Australian radio SEN.<\/p>\n

“As we sit now, I think there is a really strong chance (for the World Cup).”<\/p>\n

The NBA’s top draft pick in 2016, Melbourne-born Simmons impressed in his first years with the Philadelphia 76ers but his currency dropped during a difficult 2020\/21 playoffs campaign when he struggled from the free-throw line.<\/p>\n

Under fire for his drop-off in form, Simmons’s decision to pull out of Tokyo weeks before the Games further disappointed Australian fans.<\/p>\n

Goorjian, however, has no hard feelings over the 26-year-old’s past reluctance to play for the country and said he wanted him in his team.<\/p>\n

“Our door is always open to him and during my time with the Boomers he has always been straightforward with me,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

“But that was a very tough situation (in Philadelphia) and he was in the process of change.”<\/p>\n

\n

(Reporting by Ian Ransom in Melbourne; Editing by Robert Birsel)<\/p>\n

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MELBOURNE (Reuters) – Three-times NBA All-Star Ben Simmons is getting his health back and is a “strong chance” to represent Australia at the World Cup, coach Brian Goorjian said. The Brooklyn Nets forward has battled back and knee problems since joining the NBA side in 2021\/22, and cut his season short to recuperate. Simmons has […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":35434,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1219],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-35433","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-u-s-sports"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-content\/uploads\/Reuters_Direct_Media\/USOnlineReportSportsNews\/tagreuters.com2023binary_LYNXMPEJ4407F-VIEWIMAGE.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35433","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35433"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35433\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":35436,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35433\/revisions\/35436"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35434"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35433"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35433"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35433"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}