In everyday life with the Miami Heat, where Pelle Larsson has played for two years in the world's best basketball league, a certain amount of boredom inevitably creeps in from time to time when 82 games have to be played.
In Blågult, it is different, not least this week when Larsson & Co begin the final phase of the World Cup qualifiers with two extremely valuable matches. First, last year's European Championship fourth-place Finland awaits in Helsinki on Thursday, and then Olympic silver medallist France and world star Victor Wembanyama in a sold-out Avicii Arena on Sunday.
It feels awesome and we deserve this hype. Last year was the first time in a long time that we made it to the European Championship and after that it has only gone even better. Now we are qualifying for the World Cup and hopefully going there for the first time, says the 25-year-old from Nacka.
Three World Cup places
Sweden was in a bad position in the initial qualifying phase, but saved itself by winning the two final matches in early July.
Now the teams from the group (in addition to Sweden, also Estonia and Slovenia) will be combined with France, Finland and Hungary for the continuation of the qualifiers.
Three of the six teams will play in the World Cup in Qatar next late summer.
If we're going to have a chance at it, we probably have to win one of these two matches anyway, says Larsson, who remembers how Sweden pressured Finland right into the final seconds in the European Championship opener in Tampere last year.
Now he has been joined by another player with NBA credentials on the national team.
Our confidence grew a lot in the European Championship, especially after the match against Turkey (in the round of 16). Now we have the experience from there and basically the same guys, plus Bobi (Klintman). He and I click well on the court and give us another player who makes it harder for the opponents to defend against us.
“A dream”
Bobi Klintman has been injured and during his two NBA seasons he only managed to play a total of 20 games for Detroit, which he has now left for the Italian Bologna. Injuries were also the reason why the Skåne player turned down the European Championship last year and it was not until this summer that Klintman made his national team debut.
"It's always been a dream to play for the men's national team and the guys have made it really easy for me. You could tell they were happy I came and it's been a lot of fun so far," says Klintman, who averaged 17 points and ten rebounds in his first two internationals.
Now the 23-year-old is optimistic that Blågult will be able to reach a historic World Cup:
I think we can get there if we play at the level we can.
Six teams are playing in the group and have brought all the results from the first World Cup qualifying phase with them.
When this qualifying phase begins, France therefore stands on five wins, Finland has four wins while the other teams (Sweden, Estonia, Slovenia and Hungary) all have three wins. The top three teams will reach the World Cup in Qatar in August-September next year.
The remaining World Cup qualifiers will be decided with six matches divided into three windows, of which this is the only one where the NBA pros are involved. After this week's matches against Finland (Thursday) and France (Sunday), the qualifiers continue as follows:
November 27: Sweden–Hungary, November 30: France–Sweden.
February 25: Sweden–Finland, February 28: Hungary–Sweden.
"We need to win at least three, but probably four games to be able to reach the World Cup," says Swedish national team captain Mikko Riipinen.
