In July this year, Rabah Bouarifi, President of the Algerian Basketball Federation (FABB) declared the season null and void due to the novel Coronavirus pandemic. Based on this, he says the team is not ready to compete, and added that they cannot go to Rwanda with a decimated team and he insisted that he is against the act of participating just to participate.
Further more, Algerian head coach Faid Bilal and 4 players tested positive for COVID-19 and in addition to that it’s not easy for foreign based players to reach the country due to airspace restrictions.
This comes after national team head coach Faid Bilal had expressed concern over the team’s preparations, citing delays in starting training and adding that basketball games in the country have been stopped for more than seven months.
The Algeria Basketball National team is made up of a large number of domestic players and a small number of binationals who are based in France. Algeria had to get rid of Cape Verde in the pre-qualifiers in January before they were drawn with Nigeria, Mali and Rwanda in Group D.
The decision from the Africa basketball governing body on Group D is yet to be made whether the teams will be three or one more team will be added to complete the group. If they would have to give another wild card, there is no doubt that South Sudan would have a chance as they finished second behind Cape Verde in the recent Closing tournament held in Cameroon last month where they were looking for a team to complete Group E.
