Germany shines at basketball championships with NBA stars: start of a new hype?

There goes a European championship in their own country. Some of the sport’s biggest stars will be there. And then the badly weakened German team has an unexpected winning streak. But anyone who wants to see this event on television in this country is out of luck. The TV rights to the European Basketball Championship held in Cologne, among other places, belong to the streaming service Magenta Sport, which broadcasts the DBB selection games free of charge on the Internet.

For Ingo Weiss, President of the German Basketball Federation, an absurdity: “I find it quite ignorant and disappointing that the public broadcasters are not doing their job,” he complained on the side of the 109-107 win after two overtimes on Sunday against Lithuania (the Lithuanian protest against the game rating because of a refused free throw was dismissed on Monday night). For Weiss it is clear: The German team deserves the attention of the general public, the stars, who are mainly known to insiders in this country, are good identification figures after Dirk Nowitzki’s career end.