Only four tickets remain for Eurobasket, and it’s confirmed that we won’t see the Croatian national basketball team, which faced a historic defeat, competing at the European Championship.

Last night, Croatia lost to France 83:80 in a packed “Jazina” in Zadar, bringing their record to 2-3. Meanwhile, Bosnia and Herzegovina secured a convincing victory over Cyprus (108:62) in Tuzla and now has one more win and a superior head-to-head record against Croatia before the final round. With Cyprus as the host in this group, only two teams will advance to Eurobasket, namely BiH and France, who will clash in the last match.

This marks the first time in history that Croatia will not compete in the European Basketball Championship. The bronze medals from 1993 in Germany and 1995 in Greece are Croatia’s only achievements at this tournament. Their most noteworthy performance post-Athens was finishing fourth in Slovenia in 2013, while in the last continental event, they ended up in 12th place.

The last major tournament featuring Croatia was the European Championship three years ago, where they again finished 12th. They failed to qualify for the World Championship and the Olympic Games, and now they’ve missed the chance to participate in the upcoming EuroBasket. The next major competition for them could be the WorldBasket in Qatar in 2027, but they will need to go through pre-qualifications first.

Should Croatia fail to secure a place at the World Cup, they will miss the opportunity to qualify for the Los Angeles Olympic Games in 2028, with Eurobasket 2029 following thereafter.

Pre-qualifications for the World Cup have already commenced. The first round features teams like Switzerland, the Republic of Ireland, Kosovo, Azerbaijan, Romania, Norway, Luxembourg, Austria, Armenia, and Albania competing.

Once the first round concludes, the second round of pre-qualifications will begin, with Croatia and other teams that did not qualify for this year’s European Championship joining in. This round will consist of four groups with three teams each, where the top two from each group will move on to the qualifications. Each group will host six matches. If Croatia navigates through the second round, they will qualify for the World Basketball Championship and pursue their pathway from there.

Croatia is thus embarking on a fresh cycle from the ground up. The pressing question now is who will lead as coach. Current coach, Josip Sesar, refrained from discussing his future at last night’s press conference, only expressing gratitude to the fans.

“Thank you to the fans; I truly enjoyed the atmosphere. We struggled defensively, giving up 15 offensive rebounds. The French team is exceptional. We have one more game on Monday, and that’s it, unfortunately. We had chances to pull ahead but mishandled a few attacking situations,” said Sesar after the match.

Sesar has been in charge since 2023, taking over from Aleksandar Petrović. Following the match, the crowd expressed their discontent with Sesar’s coaching, chanting “Sesar, go away.” He indicated that he was unfazed by the sentiments.

“Not at all. I don’t pay attention to social media or listen to cheers. If I reacted to the cheers, it might have swayed my decisions on the sidelines. Everything unfolds as it should. The people appointed me to the Federation, and they are the final decision-makers,” stated Sesar.

Before the men’s team, the women’s basketball squad similarly failed to qualify for the European Championship. Additionally, Croatian media highlight that among younger teams, only the cadets currently compete in the A division.

Croatian basketball finds itself in a challenging position.

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