The clubs are like a cartel': why Amaechi wants game to change

Former NBA star says Super League Basketball has failed players - but a new plan has its high-profile critics too

- Matt Hughes

Having played professional basketball in five countries, including spells at three NBA franchises, John Amaechi would appear better qualified than most to comment on the state of the sport in this country. So when he describes the nine Super League Basketball clubs as a "cartel" who churn out "sewage", any interested parties are likely to listen - including the sports minister, Stephanie Peacock, who last week received a letter that included similar sentiments from Amaechi.

Peacock has become involved, as the battle for control of British basketball has escalated to civil war. All nine SLB clubs have begun legal proceedings against the sport's governing body, the British Basketball Federation, which last week signed a 15-year agreement with an American consortium called GBBL to operate a new men's professional league from next year.

As a result, the proposed new league has no clubs or venues, and the problems do not end there.

UK Sport, the government body responsible for elite funding, has been asked to investigate whether the £4.75m given to basketball is secure given the allegations about the BBF's tender process made by the clubs.

In another extraordinary development, SLB referees are on strike after the Sheffield Sharks owner, Vaughn Millette, accused the experienced match official Eduard Udyanskyy of racism after his side lost against the Surrey 89ers last month. "There has been an ongoing issue of racism towards my coach [Atiba Lyons] from a certain referee for years now," Millette wrote on X.

An SLB game between the Bristol Flyers and the Caledonian Gladiators was postponed later that week as referees refused to officiate in an act of solidarity with Udyanskyy, and the SLB's head of officiating, Richard Stokes, resigned in protest.