It could have been done four years ago, this time it's on track to succeed.

According to information from RMC Sport, the Cameroonian of the Piladelphia Sixers Joel Embiid would have initiated the administrative procedures to obtain French nationality and play with the French basketball team.

Our colleagues even suggest that a stay in France, where the player has family, would be in the pipeline by the end of June to finalize the file.

The FIBA ​​regulations allowing only one naturalized player per national team, this would make possible the incorporation of the best scorer of the regular season in the NBA and candidate for the title of MVP in the team of Vincent Collet.

Two years before the Paris Olympics, this news is enough to excite basketball fans, who start dreaming of a luxury association with Rudy Gobert in the racket.

If this is confirmed, we will have to see how this news will be received by the players of the France team.

In 2018, when Embiid had mentioned the possibility of joining the Blues, he had not necessarily received the best of receptions, Tony Parker and Evan Fournier not having really been very warm to the idea.

“For me, playing for a country you have no ties with is disturbing.

The national team is not just a sporting challenge.

It's not against Joel.

It bothers me when the other selections do it, so it's valid for the Blues ”, had thus drawn the leader of the Knicks on Twitter.

Batum confirms, the Blues are preparing for it

According to

L'Equipe

, the Sixers pivot revived the idea after the Tokyo Olympics and polled some executives of the France team to find out their position on the issue.

“I know that he has personally started naturalization procedures and that he would then like to be able to play for France, confirmed Boris Diaw, the general manager of the selection, to our colleagues.

That being said, we are not putting the cart before the horse and we are waiting for these steps to succeed.

»

I'm going to start playing 2/3 in EDF, apparently there are spots for the summer 😂

— Vincent Poirier (@viinze_17P) May 2, 2022


Access to this content has been blocked to respect your choice of consent

By clicking on "

I ACCEPT

", you accept the deposit of cookies by external services and will thus have access to the content of our partners

I ACCEPT

And to better remunerate 20 Minutes, do not hesitate to accept all cookies, even for one day only, via our "I accept for today" button in the banner below.

More information on the Cookie Management Policy page.


If nothing is official yet, some are preparing, not without humor, to see this monster of the NBA land in Blue, like Vincent Poirier, who plays in the same position as Embiid and who had already been crossed out. road by the Cameroonian giant during his brief stint at the Sixers between December 2020 and March 2021. “I will start playing fullback, winger in the France team.

Apparently there are spots for the summer,” joked the current Real Madrid player.

Sport

Basketball: Tony Parker "not interested" in the post of Minister of Sports

Sport

NBA: Rudy Gobert and Utah eliminated by Dallas, it goes for Philadelphia and Phoenix

  • Basketball

  • France basketball team

  • NBA

  • Philadelphia

  • Sport