As expected and revealed in our columns, the French record holder for points in selection (2,878 points) Sandrine Gruda was not selected in the extended list of 18 players to prepare for the 2024 Olympics, unveiled Thursday by the coach of the Bleues Jean- Loved Toupane. Very affected by this announcement, the 36-year-old player, international since 2006 (225 caps), reacted this Friday to her non-selection, with Basket Europe. Even though the season was hampered by injuries, Gruda, one of the best players in the history of French basketball, considered the announcement a “shock”.
“I am shocked,” she reacts in the interview carried out by the specialized media. I endure the situation. It wasn’t my plan, I wanted to be able to stop after the Games, to thank the public one last time, for all these years gone by. And I won’t be able to do that. Not even wearing that blue jersey one last time. Yet it was something that was so dear to me. I am part of this generation which values the services rendered to the French team more than a club career. Mentalities have changed but for me, the French team was my first open door to the professional world. (…) »
“For me the French team has always had a priority place. Even when I went to the WNBA, I went there having previously seen with the staff that I could return in time to serve the French team. For me, the French team was to be the starting project and the arrival point in my career and now, that is not possible, and that saddens me enormously. »
Toupane told him the news in “10 minutes”
Sandrine Gruda also goes behind the scenes of this announcement, when Jean-Aimé Toupane told her the news “eight days ago”, at Train Bleu, the very cozy restaurant at the Gare de Lyon (Paris). “The coach asked to speak to me. He makes an appointment with me. (…) He tells me that he won’t take me this summer. And it’s true that… from the moment he pronounces this sentence, it’s as if I had a whistling, a ringing in my ears, I can no longer hear anything. (…) I saw his lips move, so I knew he was speaking, but I couldn’t hear anything anymore. I am in shock. I don’t even know what to say to him actually; The meeting lasted ten minutes. I don’t know what to say to him, the only thing I ask him is “why”? »
“Actually, the date doesn’t last. There is no more exchange. As he has nothing else to say to me and I am totally, almost paralyzed, the discussion ends and he leaves. And I stay seated in my place,” says the player, very affected by this decision.
