As part of this month’s friendly basketball series between Australia and China, the YouYi (“friendship”) Games, it is interesting to read that a new face (with money attached) has entered the basketball landscape.
Basketball in Australia has a had well-publicised financial problems in recent years and thus interested, benevolent benefactors to professional teams are always well-received. The latest name to enter the fray is Professor Clive Palmer.
From the financial pages of the Sydney Morning Herald:
CLIVE’S BOOMERS
That does not mean those in the mining community are not digging in for charitable acts of their own.
As part of his one-man tour of Australia’s major sporting codes, Professor Clive Palmer – the ex-rugby league winger and owner of the Gold Coast United football team – is sponsoring basketball’s YouYI games.
The billionaire is pouring in cash and the use of his private jet,
Mineralogy, to help transport the Boomers, Australia’s national team, to Perth to take on China’s tall timber on Friday.
Has he ditched soccer for a newer, shinier code?
The ”Mineralogy Boomers” does have a nicer ring to it than ”United Mineralogy” with its socialist/mining-tax-supporting overtones.
If Palmer is interested in injecting his funds into an NBL team, I’m sure there would be some interested from Larry Sengstock and co. A man with a sporting background and financial backing is a great asset to any sport.
The YouYi Games, organised by Andrew Vlahov, hit Perth on Friday 24 June, featuring what can be essentially described as an Australian development squad.
