GB: Mark Clark speaks about his squad preparation

Mark Clark is the head coach of Great Britain's  Women senior basketball team and have started preparation for the second round of  Eurobasket Qualifiers which tip off in September with matches against Estonia, Luxembourg, Bosnia and Portugal

Great Britain are in Division B and require promotion to Division A before 2009 so that FIBA will consider allowing them to participate in the Olympics in 2012. We meet up in Italy during the U16 Women European Championships to discuss the programme for this year and how far the programme has developed since last year and Great Britain's chances of promotion to the elite this year. Great finished with 2-2 record last year and are currently lying 3rd in group B, they needed to finish in the top 2 places to qualify for the promotion play-off

 

Question: What was the process of reducing your initial preliminary roster that was announced previously in May to the current squad?

Answer: I have spent a lot of time evaluating through. I and my assistants, from what I knew we had from our video tapes of the players we had seen and the players we went to see in person - and the balance of the team.

We also took a sort of mid-term view of some of the players we would like to add; now looking forward so when we thought that we wanted to focus the programme on 14/15 players that we were going to use during that as opposed to going through the process of picking up 20 + players and then to some extend spending 4 or 5 days reducing to 15. And, so okay, I think at the end the players that are in, we thought at the start of the process that there may be some interesting buts about the last 2 or 3 players. But once we went through it we found that we are very comfortable with the group of players we have finally selected.

We think that the process is going to work for us this year.

 

Question: What is your plan of integration of new players into the squad this year?

Answer: Not only do we have new players from last year. We also have new players to international basketball and some of the players that are new to international basketball have never been part of a national team seen at all in the United Kingdom. Some of them have never played basketball in the United Kingdom but what we have got is a nice balance of experienced players who have been through that scenario. And we are going to be making sure that we spend as much time as we need making the new players comfortable and those who have not been around for some time.

Chantell Handy for example has been away for 3 or 4 years, she has been in college in the States. It is going to be as different for her as it is going to be for Megan Moody and Kim Butlers coming in - in terms of being new. So we’ll make sure that we bring these new players in, in the same way, that we had new faces last year: We spent time integrating players like Georgia Jones into the senior group.

 

Question: What can you tell me about the final roster?

Answer: The 15-player roster is final. We are not looking at anybody else at the moment. Obviously as we go through the process you never know what’s going to happen injury wise. We’ve looked at the performance of the U20s in terms of the players registered with FIBA. We’ve added Lauren Thomson-Johnson, Siobhan Prior and Helen Naylor who did an excellent job with the GB U20 squad. The disappointment is not having Joanna Leedham because of college commitments in the States but we have some back-up if we have injuries. It is also because I think it is important to break down (the elements) and bring players into the senior international programme, for junior players around the United Kingdom to bring them to practices. It’s just like other nations bringing guest players to their practice sessions. We are covered and we are very comfortable with the 15 we got: Kim Butler, Kate Butters, Stephanie Collins, Joanna Clayden, Andrea Congreaves, Kate Crowley, Arek Denk, Louise Gannon, Chantelle Handy, Lisa Hutchinson, Sally Kaznica, Georgia Jones, Kristy Lavin, Rosalee Mason, Megan Moody.

 

Question: What do you expect for the Eurobasket Division B qualifiers?

Answer: Of course we are hoping to qualify. We do not enter these things without wanting to qualify. It is important for GB to establish themselves as a A-division team whether at the end of this year or in two years’ time. It is important ahead of 2012 for GB to be a A-division team.

Because of the point spread between Bosnia and Portugal it is going to be incredibly difficult for us to qualify unless we go 4:0. And if go 4:0 that’s when we give ourselves a chance and then we are looking at other results and point difference and things like that. So all we can do is take care of our own business. We have to beat Estonia in the first game which is a tough game - which was a tough game when we played them last year. We came up with some big performances in Tallin last year, obviously we are going to be confidant playing at home. We’ve got to beat them. Then Luxembourg took every team except us close last year. We played very well against them in Cardiff and going to Luxembourg we have got ourselves two first wins under our belt before we can start thinking about qualifying with a 4:0 record. We have to take the first two games and we are not looking beyond Estonia at the moment.

 

Question: What do you think about Manchester as the venue and your training camp base?

Answer: It is a great venue. I am very happy at it being in Manchester: as a club it has really a great base of support and I am expecting to sell out the Amaechi arena for the two games. The people at Manchester, Joe Forber and Jeff Jones, have done a great job helping us out and I am really pleased to be at the Amaechi.

It was great in Cardiff and Nottingham last year but this year Manchester is going to be our home for 7 weeks and we are talking about 7 weeks because that is what the promotion games will entail. Manchester is going to be home and we are very comfortable with the set-up and with the people that are going to be helping us out. I also hope that it is a place that visiting teams may not like to come to (home advantage and atmosphere in favour of Great Britain).

 

Question: What about the staff you are going to work with?

Answer: Sergio Lara Bercial as the lead assistant has some specific responsibilities around defence and in particularly helping some of our perimeter players in trying to get across the message we are trying to get across on the court. Damien Jennings did an excellent job last year of breaking some things down in terms of the opposition so we have got exactly the same staff as last year. We have brought in a new strengthening conditioning guy Duncan Irvine who is very good and he is going to work with Duncan French who is responsible for this department. I was asked by British Performance Basketball if I was happy with my staff and I had no hesitation in bringing back everybody together as I am very happy with the quality of people I have got.

 

 

 

Answer: My philosophy on captains has changed over the years especially on national teams so we are not going to have a captain as such. Obviously somebody is going to be on the score sheet as captain and all that type of stuff.

If you look at the squad we’ve got people like Andrea Congreaves, Katie Crowley and Rosalee Mason and Kristy Lavin, to name a few and other players who have a lot of experience. And speaking with as many people I needed to speak to, it is like I would like all those people to take leadership roles. If I select a captain then everybody looks out for that person and I can sometimes miss out on some leadership quality.

Kelli McHugh did a good job for us last year as the captain but at the end of the day I want every one of those experienced players to step up and take leadership responsibilities. Obviously some people are going to take the right decisions at the right time.

You asked me about integration earlier on as well. And I think that the experienced players have to take a bit responsibility in trying to integrate everybody else. That cannot be one person’s responsibility. So I am not looking to have a captain or even be worried about who is the captain. For example we made Michelle "Missy" Lender the captain for our game in Cardiff. It was nothing to do with her leadership, it was just it was good for her and good for the promotion at that venue and she had earned that for number of years she had played basketball in the United Kingdom.

I think that we are going to have a team of captains.