“Vesely wants to represent!” pic courtesy of my Czech friend Honza Moucha

In the first week of March, Jan Vesely told Czech Sport Daily that he wants to represent the Czech Republic at EuroBasket 2013. Is anyone surprised? Probably not, but in his homeland this constituted big news. Honza hasn’t played for the Czech national team in four years, and some fans at home surely began to grow angry at him not suiting up. His last game happened to be in August 2009 during the relegation round of EuroBasket 2009 qualification, where the Czechs went 3-3, losing to Oleksiy Pecherov and the Ukraine team in their final game. In six career games for the Czech Republic senior team, Vesely has averaged 11 points, 5.5 rebounds and 0.8 assists.

That final game also marks the last time Jan played on the same team with his close buddy Tomas Satoransky, back when they were a couple of cool teen kids nicknamed “The Gunpowder” (Tomas) and “The Detonator” (Jan) by the Czech media. Vesely has indicated that he’s longing for games where he can play a crucial role, and he will get the opportunity to do so on September 4, 2013, when the Czechs open EuroBasket in a game against the host nation, Slovenia. It seems Vesely was so anxious to play that he picked up a phone and called George Zidek, the Czech National Team GM. Said Zidek, “The fact that Honza called me personally, I consider it the most important [thing]. In the past, it was not always the rule. We talked about our preliminary plan for preparation and games, then Honza chatted with Coach Budinsky and declared his interest in representing the country.”

Some quotes Vesely uttered in the short interview:

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