SULLIVAN PRAISES TEAM GB'S DEPTH
04/27/2009

Great Britain captain Andrew Sullivan believes the newly named 23-man roster for this summer has so much quality in it that even his place in the team cannot be guaranteed, but insists that is good for the sport.

Head coach Chris Finch has compiled a squad list for the training camp in August, as Britain prepare for Game On At The O2 in London and then the EuroBasket finals in Poland. It includes Chicago Bulls pair Luol Deng and Ben Gordon and Scotland's Robert Archibald as well as Pops Mensah-Bonsu, Andy Betts and Joel Freeland.

"The great thing is that when the programme started a few years ago there weren't that many people on Chris's list, good or bad. Chris was calling everyone who had ever been to a training camp before, but since then the quality has been getting better and better," said Sullivan.

"Now, it is not just that we have got more guys to choose from but that we have got quality as well. We now have quality and quantity which is going up year after year.

"I have said that if I don't make it to the Europeans this year, or the Olympics in 2012, because someone else is better than me then the country is going in the right direction.

"It shouldn't be an easy ride for anyone. The last thing I want is to be 35 and Chris phoning me and persuading me to play for one more year. I would like to know I can retire and there will be players there to replace me straight away."

Sullivan also gave his backing to Tafari Toney, the 22-year-old Newcastle Eagle who has taken the BBL by storm this season.

"It's great we have a guy out of the BBL who Chris views as a possible help to us. We want guys from our home country's league representing the team because they are players that fans here are watching week in week out.

"I have seen Tefari play and it will be hard work for him to make it because there will be other big guys who have been playing at a very high level this season. But then again the guy has hit 20 rebounds in a game and no matter what league you're playing in you can't argue with that sort of stat."

Toney won the BBL dunk contest at the National Indoor Arena in January and will hope to return to Birmingham with the Eagles, when the BBL finals take place May 2-3, and Finch believes that while the BBL Champions may be the favourites it's anyone's trophy for the taking.

"It's hard to go against Newcastle but my gut feeling tells me that someone else will end up triumphing," said Finch.

"The BBL gets a hard time some times, unnecessarily. It's a tough little league, I know it well. I know exactly what type of players succeed there and I hope in the future that they will have an even bigger role to develop players, not just for GB but in Europe and the USA too.

"Everybody who had potential was considered. We had some tough decisions to make with only 23 guys being named for the training squad."