Moritz Wagner to miss World Cup Qualifiers and EuroBasket for Germany / News - Basketnews.com

Credit: FIBA Credit FIBA

Bad news has reached the German national team ahead of the 2023 FIBA World Cup Qualifiers and EuroBasket 2022.

Moritz Wagner

Position:PF, CAge:25Height:211 cmWeight:111 kgBirth place:Berlin, GermanyProfileNewsStatistics

The Germany Basketball Federation has announced that Orlando Magic forward Moritz Wagner will miss the rest of the summer, crossing the player out of the two international tournaments.

"I'll tell it like it is. This one hurts," Wagner told about the situation. "For years I was looking forward to this tournament and this opportunity: to play in Germany, in Cologne and my city Berlin, with my brother, at a home European Championship, was something that I had dreamed of for a long time now."

The 25-year-old player mentioned an ankle injury to be the reason behind the decision.

"Spending the summer with the guys who make this experience thoroughly unique was my highlight of last year and was something I looked forward to with excitement all season. The fact that now the ankle is not playing along is difficult to accept at first but it's part of it," he explained. "This team is special, and I'm looking forward to watching the guys play and supporting them."

Moritz's brother Franz is continuing to prepare for the upcoming tournaments together with other players of the German national team.

"This is a hard blow for us and especially for him. He wanted so much to play in Germany, in front of his own fans in his country. Moritz is a great basketball player and a really good guy. Health comes first and we all wish Moritz a speedy and complete recovery. He still has many good basketball years ahead of him," head coach Gordon Herbert said.

Germany is placed in Group B of EuroBasket 2022 together with France, Slovenia, Lithuania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Hungary. The team is set to play its first friendly match of the preparatory cycle today against Belgium.

Germany national team's current roster:

No. Player Team 1 Robin Benzing Fortitudo Bologna 2 Niels Giffey Free Agent 3 Justus Hollatz CB Breogan 4 David Kramer Basketball Lowen Braunschweig 5 Leon Kratzer Telekom Baskets Bonn 6 Maodo Lo ALBA Berlin 7 Andreas Obst FC Bayern Munich 8 Kenneth Ogbe EWE Baskets Oldenburg 9 Dennis Schroder Free Agent 10 Christian Sengfelder Brose Bamberg 11 Daniel Theis Indiana Pacers 12 Johannes Thiemann ALBA Berlin 13 Johannes Voigtmann CSKA Moscow 14 Franz Wagner Orlando Magic 15 Jonas Wohlfarth-Bottermann Hamburg Towers Like what we are doing? You can express your gratitude here.