Sport
18 June, 2023
Wheelchair basketball sensation staring in Dubai
Horsham's very own wheelchair basketball star Jannik Blair is currently competing at the International Wheelchair Basketball Federation (IWBF) World Championships in Dubai. Competing as part of the Australian men's national wheelchair basketball...
Horsham's very own wheelchair basketball star Jannik Blair is currently competing at the International Wheelchair Basketball Federation (IWBF) World Championships in Dubai.
Competing as part of the Australian men's national wheelchair basketball team, the Aussie Rollers, Blair first started playing wheelchair basketball in 2005, and his form as a one-pointer caught the attention of then Australian coach Ben Ettridge.
In 2009 he was selected to represent Australia at the Asia Oceania Wheelchair Basketball Championships, and has been a vital component of the team ever since.
The Rollers faced off against Italy in their first game of the tournament, winning by 10 points with Blair notching up six points of his own.
This win was backed up by a whopping 111 point win against the United Arab Emirates on Tuesday night.
Speaking after the match against the United Arab Emirates, Blair said "there are good ways to win and bad ways to win".
"We (Aussie Rollers) think we did a pretty good job of sticking to our processes today," he said.
"So we just want to stick to that process, and to make sure that we play with the same respect against each opposition regardless of whether we're likely to win or whether we're expecting a challenge.
"We were happy that we started our process and that we can take something away from the win."
The Aussie Rollers faced off against Brazil yesterday, with Blair adding that the team planned to stick to the same process that they think is going to be successful against everybody.
"Hopefully we can get the win against Brazil, then we finish top of our pool," he said.
"We should expect a pretty easy round 16 game against Egypt. We are likely to be fourth in our crossover pool.
"It looks like we'd most likely get the USA in the quarter-finals, which would be a tough quarter, but definitely one that we think we can win."