United states professional basketball leagueNbaIn collaboration with the international basketball federation (fiba), it was announced that preparations for the new professional men's basketball federation will be launched in january next year. The tournament will cover the major european basketball markets, marking the official entry into substantive phase of the deep integration and long-term configuration of the european markets of the two major basketball organizations。
The discussions between nba and fiba on the creation of a european league have continued for many years. The influence of european players in nba has increased in recent years, with about one out of every six players in the coalition currently coming from europe, including top stars such as jokic, anttokunbo, venbanyama and donchic. Chairman shawa of nba said that the dialogue with various stakeholders reinforced the view that “there are great opportunities for creating a new league on the european continent”。
According to the american consumer news and business channel (cnbc), nba estimates that europe has 270 million potential basketball fans and views them as a large “undeveloped market”. Basketball has become the fastest growing movement in europe, second only to football. However, existing european basketball competitions (e. G. The european basketball league) are considered to be undervalued and lacked representation on top teams in major cities。
Under the programme currently published, the new league is designed to balance business stability with the openness of sports competition. It is planned to establish a fixed number of “permanent” seats, while providing “accomplish-based annual promotion” to all european national league teams attached to fiba. Any club with ambition can be eligible to participate in the competition in two ways: first, through the fiba “bcl” championship; and second, in the final season qualifying tournament. The secretary-general of fiba, andreas zaghklis, stressed that the game “respects the principles of the european model of sport” ensured fair and open competition。
The current programme, tentatively organized as a league, consists of 16 teams, of which 12 are fixed seats and the remaining 4 are selected through qualification. The target countries include the united kingdom, france, spain, italy, germany, greece and turkey, with focus cities covering london, paris, madrid, barcelona, rome, milan, munich, berlin, athens and istanbul. Nba and fiba are committed to investing funds and resources to support the overall development of the european basketball ecosystem, including supporting national leagues, club youth training colleges, and expanding existing players, coaches and referee development programmes。
If progress is successful, the new league is planning to open its first season in october 2027, and nba and fiba will begin consultations with potential teams next january, and will publish more details in the coming months。
