READ MORE: <\/strong>What ravaged Roosters must do as star exodus looms<\/strong><\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n <\/strong><\/p>\n READ MORE: <\/strong>Incredible tiny detail revealed in Paris medals<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n Instead, there were no handshakes or other pleasantries before the qualifier in Riga, Latvia, an alternative venue because of the war in Gaza.<\/p>\n \u201cBasketball Ireland informed FIBA Europe yesterday that as a direct result of recent comments made by Israeli players and coaching staff \u2014 including inflammatory and wholly inaccurate accusations of antisemitism, published on official Israeli federation channels \u2014 that our players will not be partaking in traditional pre-match arrangements with our upcoming opponents,\u201d a statement on Friday morning from Basketball Ireland read.<\/p>\n \u201cThis includes exchanging of gifts, formal handshakes before or after the game, while our players will line up for the national anthem by our bench, rather than centre court. Basketball Ireland fully supports our players in their decision."<\/p>\n https:\/\/twitter.com\/BballIrl\/status\/1755614843258937805?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw<\/a><\/p>\n While Ireland defied pressure to boycott the match \u2014 the organisation said it was not feasible despite several players having opted not to travel to Riga.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s known that they are quite antisemitic and it\u2019s no secret, and maybe that\u2019s why a strong game is expected,\u201d Saar, a United States-based player, said in an interview published by the Israeli Basketball Association.<\/p>\n \u201cWe have to show that we\u2019re better than them and win. We talk about it among ourselves. We know they don\u2019t love us and we will leave everything on the court always but in this game especially.\u201d<\/p>\n Israel ran out eventual winners of the match 87-57.<\/p>\n The teams are in Group E together with France and Latvia. Ireland is scheduled to host Israel later in the year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Ireland women's basketball team shunned normal pre-match courtesies when it faced Israel in their EuroBasket qualifying match on Friday after being outraged by accusations […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":366479,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/366477"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=366477"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/366477\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":366480,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/366477\/revisions\/366480"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/366479"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=366477"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=366477"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=366477"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/p>\n