Dar City ready for BAL debut in Pretoria

The Tanzanian side will take on the Giants at the Sun Bet Arena in Pretoria this afternoon at 3pm. 

Speaking to the media ahead of the clash, Gueye admitted that while his side is relatively young, they are determined to compete. 

"We are excited and very focused on the challenges that we have. This is the first participation for a Tanzanian team at the Basketball Africa League," said Gueye.

"The level is very high and we know it as we are a very young team created only three years ago but we are developing the team and we’ll see what may happen.

"We are a very young team but we are very determined. We are well prepared, we had a training camp in Zanzibar. We will focus on what we can control and be the best we can be."

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After their clash against the Giants, Dar will face their East African neighbours Nairobi City Thunder on Saturday, and captain Hasheem Thabeet believes the squad is mentally ready for the challenge that lies ahead. 

"Personally I’ve played basketball for a lot of years, us being young, you know, at the end of the day it’s basketball. You’ve got five guys on the court, we’ve got to go and compete," he said. 

"We’ve been preparing very well with the coach like the coach is saying, it’s not gonna be magic. We are not going to try and do something that we don’t know.

"We’ll come with strategy, the other team is also gonna come with strategy and we are gonna compete. So, we are ready, I feel like we prepared well to come and compete against anybody.

"We had a good training camp in Zanzibar for the past month, we’re here now and we are very excited."