The NBA champion with Denver and Finals MVP Nikola Jokic is not on the list of Serbian players selected to play in the World Cup.
If Serbia want to clinch a World Cup medal for the first time since 2014, they will have to do so without their superstar Nikola Jokic. The Denver Nuggets pivot, crowned NBA champion last June while being elected MVP of the Finals, is not on the list of Serbian players selected for the World Cup, which will be held from August 25 to September 10 in Indonesia, Japan and the Philippines.
“With Jokic, we had several conversations, and I would say they are some of the best conversations I’ve had with players who couldn’t make it into the squad. He is exhausted, physically and mentally, and he did not feel ready for this responsibility at the moment,” said Serbia coach Svetislav Pesic. This season, with the Nuggets, the 28-year-old pivot averaged 24.5 points, 11.8 rebounds and 9.8 assists in the regular season and 30 points, 13.5 rebounds and 9.5 assists in the play-offs. Monumental!
A medal with Serbia for Jokic
To date, Nikola Jokic has played three competitions with the Serbian team: the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio where he won the silver medal, the 2017 World Cup where Serbia were eliminated in the quarter-finals by Argentina, and Euro 2022 where Serbia were eliminated by Italy in the round of 16 when they were the favorites. The Joker prefers to rest this summer, perhaps to better return during the Olympic Games in Paris in 2024? The future will tell.
To qualify, Serbia will have to finish among the two best European teams (except France, automatically qualified) at the World Cup. Otherwise, it will have to go through a TQO. Without Nikola Jokic, this team, which must face Sudan, China and Puerto Rico in the first round, is less scary, even if, in the expanded list, there are four NBA players (Bogdan Bogdanovic, Nikola Jovic, Filip Petrusev and Aleksej Pokusevski). But not on the level of the Joker.
