The U18 Women's Basketball Asian Cup was originally a youth basketball tournament that did not attract particularly high attention, but it received special attention from Chinese fans, and some fans were even looking around for where to watch the live broadcast of the game. Naturally, TV stations will not broadcast this kind of event live, whether it is our CCTV TV or Internet TV station, they do not have too much attention to this game. However, the official account opened by FIBA on the short video platform, including the official website of FIBA, can be seen to broadcast the whole game, not only the Chinese women's basketball game, but also the rest of the games.
At 19 o'clock this evening, the Chinese women's basketball team will usher in the second game of the group stage back-to-back, and the opponent will be the New Zealand women's basketball team. New Zealand lost to the Japanese women's basketball team by 40 points in the first game, and Japan is also one of the four favorites to win the tournament, but the strength of the New Zealand team is definitely stronger than the Indonesian team, we can see them as a strengthened version of the Indonesian team, a weakened version of the Australian women's basketball team. The last Chinese U18 women's basketball team was defeated by the Australian team and missed the championship, and this time we have played against the Indonesian team, so we should be no stranger to the style of the New Zealand team.
The Indonesian and New Zealand women's basketball teams are both teams that have been trained under the Australian basketball system for a long time, so the style of play is very similar to the Australian team. It's just that there is a huge gap between the Australian team and the Australian team in terms of personal physical condition, overall technical and tactical ability, including personal comprehensive quality, but the New Zealand team is still stronger than the Indonesian team, which needs the attention of the Chinese team.
The reason why our fans pay more attention to this game, a very important reason is that Zhang Ziyu, who has attracted much attention in China, is more than two meters tall young center, crossed the level to participate in the U18 Women's Basketball Asian Cup, she is now only 17 years old, Zhang Ziyu, who has just entered the international arena, what kind of performance can be the focus of everyone's attention. Everyone understands that such a height is definitely a treasure-level talent in the women's basketball world, but whether such a talent can be exchanged for the final result depends on the future development path.
Basketball is not just about the time when you have height, but you can dominate with interior players. In the 2021 Women's Basketball Asian Cup, the Chinese team was still defeated by the Japanese second team and lost the Asian championship for ten consecutive years in the case of Han Xu and Li Yueru, and we were able to win the main force of the Japanese team and regain the Asian Cup championship in last year's Asian Cup. So Zhang Ziyu, of course, we can expect something from her, but we can't pin all our hopes on her. If the outside line is not matched, the Chinese women's basketball team cannot rely on a Zhang Ziyu to continue to maintain its current glory.
In the first game, Zhang Ziyu came off the bench and scored 19 points plus 7 rebounds very efficiently, which was obtained in 13 minutes of playing time, which was very efficient. But in the same way, her physical problems are very serious, Yinni is such a low-intensity game, a game can't last for three minutes and can't run, so you have to quickly replace it to rest, then this game against New Zealand must be more intense, so it can be expected that considering her physical problems, Zhang Ziyu will most likely have to come off the bench in this game.