ENGLAND’s surprise World Cup 2018 Bid ‘hero’, Eddie Afekafe, today has given his backing to the growing ‘Say Yes’ campaign which supports British Basketball’s bid for a place in the London 2012 Olympics.
Eddie, who is Social Inclusion Manager for Manchester City Football Club and who played basketball as a schoolboy as a ‘point guard’, said: “It’s vitally important to use a range of sports to reach everyone and basketball is a key sport in this category.
“I am a great fan of basketball and I follow the league closely and I will be booking my tickets when I know for sure that we will have a team represented at 2012.
“Basketball helps engage young people from different communities and different ethnic backgrounds and I think the growth of the game in the last five years just proves what a success basketball can be. Having a GB team at the Olympics will only increase the sports popularity.”
Afekafe hit the headlines during England’s World Cup 2018 Bid when he delivered a mesmerizing and passionate appeal for England to stage the World Cup alongside Prince William, Prime Minister David Cameron and David Beckham.
British Basketball has launched a ‘Say Yes’ campaign inviting fans and players to sign a giant basketball jersey to show their support to have a Standard Life GB team at the Olympics. The decision is due to be made by the governing body FIBA on March 13 2011.
Patrick Baumann, Secretary-General of FIBA was encouraged by the campaign and said: “I’m very pleased to see that British Basketball is doing its utmost to lobby for the upcoming decision and to try and make FIBA understand how deep the involvement of the people in basketball is and how much they want to see the GB teams play at the Olympic Games.
“Anything they do in this respect deserves a lot of credit and appreciation from FIBA and of course I hope the feedback from the people in Britain will be overwhelmingly positive given that basketball has such an amazing opportunity.”
