Pierre Vincent is the new National Coach

Pierre Vincent is 43 years old and has been involved in basketball for the past twenty years. Before coming to Bourges in 2003 he did most of his work for the Federation with National youth teams. He also spent three years training a club in the equivalent of the fifth division for men (NM3).

Before his success with Bourges he greatest achievement was with the the U18 men during the 2000 European Championship. France won the title and a number of players from that group are today playing in the NBA.

His first task ash head coach is qualify for Eurobasket 2009. The draw will take place this coming weekend in Italy.

He will still remain as head coach at Bourges.

France beat Italy to close tournament

France finished off the competition in Cervia, Italy with a victory (61-51) against the hosts Italy. Sandrine Gruda marked her authority in this game right from the tip-off scoring the first 8 points for France. France opened the first significant gap early in the second period to lead by nine points. Italy find the energy and resource to inflict a 9:0 run of their own to trail by only 2 points at the interval.

France extended their advantage to five point by the end of 3rd period and killed the game as a contest midway through the final period. In general it is a game that both coaches will have a lot to reflect about. France gave a solid demonstration of what they can do in defence but will have to work on their free throws. Italy have played better and did not do themselves justice in this game. A game that both coaches will want to quickly forget as neither team played well for any significant period of time.

Both teams are in the same group for the European championships and will play each other again on the 26 September.

France 61 - 51 Italy ( 13-10, 15-16,14-11,19-14)

France: Beikes 0, Le Dréan 4, Dumerc 14, Gruda 18, Lawson-Wade 7, Sauret-Gillespie 5, Reghaïssia 3, Gomis 0, Bade 2, Dijon 5, Yacoubou 3

Italy: Franchini 3, Sottana 2 , Zara 6 Zanoli 2 , Modica 0, Masciadri 5, Giauro 2 , Ress 4 , Dacic 6 , Macchi 21

Serbia beat France

After a day off France were back in action today with a match against Serbia.
The first half of the match belonged to France as they opened up an eleven point lead at the interval (37-28). Things started to go wrong for France in the 3rd period as Serbia scored 10 unanswered points. France were at loss in dealing with the inside outside alternative game of their opponents and were not able to find the rhythm of the first period and conceded the match (65-72).


Serbia were strong in all sectors of the game, shooting an impressive 61% within the arc , 17-of-18 from the charity stripes. They also won the battles of the boards 37:33.

France will play Italy in their last match tomorrow.

France 65-72 Serbia (21-16, 16-12, 13-25, 15-19)

France : Beikes 4, Le Dréan 12, Dumerc 8, Gruda 11, Lawson-Wade 6, Sauret-Gillespie 3, Reghaïssia 2, Gomis 2, Bade 9, Dijon 1, Yacoubou 7, Ndongue (dnp)
Serbia : Kresovic 4, Petrovic 7, Radocaj 2, Veselovskj, Mitov, Musovic 15, Puskar 10 , Ilic, Dabovic 19, Grubor 9, Perovic 6

France beat Germany in overtime

France are playing their last series of matches before heading down to Chieti in Cervia Italy.

France was made to work hard for their victory against Germany (58-52) in overtime. For Germany Linda Fröhlich and Martina Weber look more comfortable after only joining up with the squad recently and put up a much better performance then their previous outing against Mali, they combined for 27-of-52 points for their side.

The match itself was not a classic, France did not shoot the ball well, scoring only 1 from down town and hitting only 33% from within the arc. Germany were not much better with only 2-from-14 from beyond the arc but 49% from beyond the arc. France won the rebound battle finished with 17/22 from the charity stripes, which in the end was the difference between the two teams.

Germany had a five point lead going into the final period and increased their advantage to 7 points before allowing France back to equalise six second before the end of the fourth period

France 58 – 52 Germany: (12-11, 9-13, 14-16, 13-8, 10-4)
France: Beikes 0, Le Dréan 6, Dumerc 7, Gruda 11, Lawson-Wade 7, Sauret-Gillespie 1, Reghaïssia 0, Gomis 6, Bade 0, Dijon 8, Ndongue 10, Yacoubou 2

Germany: Sarah Austmann 2, Corry Berger (dnp), Anne Breitreiner 9, Linda Fröhlich 11, Petra Gläser 1, Natalie Gohrke 1, Katharina Kühn 2, Alexandra Müller 2, Roli-Ann Nikagbatse 8, Dorothea Richter (dnp ), Margret Skuballa 0, Martina Weber 16

Sandra LE Dréan joins the 200 club

Sandra Le Dréan became the 11th player to reach 200 caps for France in the match against China during the international tournament in Riga, Latvia.

Sandra turned 30 in May and earned her first senior cap in 1996 as a teenager against South Korea. This will be her fifth Eurobasket tournament (1999,2001,2003,2005). She already has a Gold and Silver medal in her collection. She has also played in the last two world championships and also participated in the Sydney Olympic Games .


(Photo:Hervé Le Fellic/Berry Républicain)

France Eurobasket Roster Confirmed

Photo: Fabien SAVOUROUX

The 19 players selected to prepare for Eurobasket 2007 spent the first two weeks of August in Alpe d'Huez, they had a a couple of games with Sweden, one scrimmage and one official international match which was won by France (85-57). After this phase of preparation , Caroline Koechlin-Aubert, Amélie Pochet and Fatimatou Sacko were dropped from the squad.

France then hosted a 4 nation tournament and finished 3rd with one victory against Lithuania and defeats against Russia and the Czech Republic. After this competition , Florence Lepron, Géraldine Robert and Elodie Godin were dropped from the squad.

France completed their preparation matches in France last week with two victories against Australia. Elodie Bertal was the last player to be dropped from the squad.

The 12 player retained for the championships are currently in Paris at the moment and will travel to Italy later in the week to take part in one last preparation tournament in Carvia before heading out to Chieti.

The 12 player Roster:

Krissy BADE (Valenciennes)
Clémence BEIKES (Tarbes)
Sandra DIJON (Montpellier)
Céline DUMERC (Bourges)
Emilie GOMIS (Valenciennes)
Sandrine GRUDA (Ekaterinbourg, Russia)
Edwige LAWSON (CSKA Moscow, Russia)
Sandra LE DREAN (USK Prague, Czech Republic)
Emmeline NDONGUE (Bourges)
Sabrina REGHAISSA (Valenciennes)
Audrey SAURET GILLESPIE (Taranto, Italy)
Isabelle YACOUBOU (Tarbes)

More French International news

Sabrina Réghaissia has been called in to the French Senior squad as a replacement for Emmanuelle Hermouet. She will join the squad when they start the preparations in August.

Sabrina has played for France 34 times and has won medals as a junior international.



France U21
France beat Russian to clinch the bronze medal in the world championships last week in a dramatic finish (67-61). The USA went on to win the the title by beating Australia in the final.

France U20

The final roster for the U20 Championship which starts later today was announced on Wednesday. 5 members of the U21 bronze medal team have been included in the roster.

Marielle Amant (189-C-89)
Melanie Arnaud (186-F-88)
Ana-Maria Cata-Chitiga (191-C-89)
Anais Deas (165-G-87)
Jennifer Digbeu (190-F/C-87)
Pauline Jannault (193-F/C-87)
Laetitia Kamba (186-C-87)
Gaetane Merlot (179-F-87)
Endene Miyem (188-F-88)
Carine Paul (176-F-88)
Fanny Ploegaerts (170-G-88)
Ingrid Tanqueray (164-G-88)

France U18
With Spain beating Russia in the final match of the qualifying round, France was out of the race for the medals. The players then had to pick themselves up from a game ending buzzer shot defeat against Ukraine to beat Italy for seventh place. This was the worst finishing position since 1998 in this age group.

French International news

Diandra Tchatchouang (pictured left) top scored with 17 points as France beat Slovakia (70 -49) in their last qualification match. The French players then had to sit through the remaining pool games to find out if this victory was enough for them to qualify for the semi-final. Lithuania already eliminated kept French hopes alive as they defeated the Czech Republic (77-68) with Gintare Petronyte scoring 34 points and taking 24 rebounds.

Lithuania victory qualified Russia for the semi-final, so the the final match was not that important but Spain needed to win to continue the defence of their title. Spain thrashed Russia 76-39 to clinch top spot in Group E as both teams made it through to the semi-finals of the UMCOR U18 European Championship for Women, eliminating France in the process.

France will now play in the classification group 5th -8th and play Ukraine on Saturday.


France U21:
France will play Brazil later today in the quarterfinal of the U21 women's world championship. Sandrine Gruda and Isabelle Yacoubou have been putting up good numbers in the competition. France won the Bronze medal 4 years ago and on current form are expected to do no worse this time around.

France U20:

France had a couple of preparation matches against Mali A last weekend. France won both matches comfortable (82-70) and (81-60). With quite a number of U20 internationals on duty at the world championships a decision on the 12 players for the European U20 championship will not be made until next week.

France Senior:
16 members of the squad spent the week in Paris at INSEP, undergoing physical and fitness tests. Basically the week give the head coach a chance to work a little with the players and discuss how the training camp will be conducted when the all the players report back in August for the long preparation towards Eurobasket 2007.