Basketball On The Internet.

IF FIBA genuinely has any stake in ensuring its international events are pristine and played with no foxing - let alone fixing - then it needs to revisit its post-intragroup stage.

To put a serious end to any jockeying, contriving of results or accusations of tanking, which obviously is very topical today, there is a perfect and simple solution.

At the end of the intragroup stage, put all the No.1 seeds' ping-pong balls in a box, and all the No.4 finishers in a box.

Then draw them out randomly so no No.4 can know which No.1 it will face in the round-of-16 ahead of time.

Similarly, put all the balls of the No.2 seeds into a box and all the No.3s in a separate box and again draw the lottery.

What does that achieve?

It makes every team in every group try to win every game.

No team can know ahead of time which team it potentially might meet in the round-of-16.

So endeavoring to avoid the USA becomes a redundant exercise for example.

FIBA can maintain its seedings through that system too, by which I mean, if it arguably has USA at #1, Spain at #2, Greece at #3, Lithuania at #4 and it wants seed 1v4 potentially in the semis and 2v3 in the other, well none of the above restructure of the post-group stage would impact that as it still could devise its draw that way.

If those seeds don't happen to make it, that's the way the ball bounces.

But that ball would be bouncing fairly and not skewing in any direction.

It also means referees can call games straight without any agenda. Not that they have any, of course. Ahem.

Would FIBA even consider something like this?

It absolutely should because European and South American teams have been contriving results for eons.

It is part-and-parcel of Eurobasket and has been going on at Olympics for yonks.

Hell, pretty sure Spain mailed one in against Brazil in London to get a more favorable draw that eventually led it to the Gold Medal game. 

Or try Beijing, where Lithuania took a 31-point belting from Australia in its last intragroup game, resting its key men and a few days later, playing off for Bronze.

No-one batted an eyelid.

Today Slovenia is bleating because it finished second and Australia third in Group D in Gran Canaria?

Wow. Allow me to wipe away my crocodile tears.

If they had beaten Lithuania and not choked as profoundly as they did (two points in the final quarter to squander a 62-55 lead with a period to play) they would have finished first in Group D.

Did Australia put its best foot forward against Angola?

It didn't have to because it already was through to the round-of-16 so why not rest guys who have played four games in five days?

Of course, FIBA's current system is vulnerable while the USA remains the team no-one wants to face early.

But there is a simple way to fix it.

And that would end any attempts to fix it.

Here was my take on the alleged "controversy" today at News Corp: http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/sport/basketball/slovenia-has-noone-to-blame-but-itself-for-dropping-to-second-at-fiba-world-cup/story-fnii09gt-1227048943941

MEANWHILE with FIBA looking for tenders for the 2019 and 2023 World Cups, Basketball Australia should be jumping onto the front foot to secure one of those tournaments.

We had a highly successful FIBA Women's World Championship in 1994 and the World 22-and-Under Men in 1997.

Staging the groups in places such as Perth, Adelaide, Melbourne and Brisbane for example, then descending on Sydney for the finals makes perfect sense.

If worse comes to worst, then maybe try for an Oceania link and play one of the groups in Auckland.

Whatever. But the time to move on that is now, if not yesterday.

Over to you BA.

AH the joys of social media.

I had an extended conversation on Twitter today with journalist Luis Araujo ... in Portuguese!

Thank goodness for Google Translate!