The center of the Ukrainian national team Artem Pustovoy noticed bias on the part of the referees towards the Ukrainians at the qualifying matches for the 2023 World Cup. In his opinion, the International Basketball Federation (FIBA) does not want to see Ukraine at the world championship.

The basketball player stated this in an interview with Public Sports..

“I don’t know, maybe it’s just my opinion. Perhaps no one is waiting for the World Cup in Ukraine, no one needs us there. This is no longer a sport, but rather a business. Well, we'll come and play. And there, first of all, people look at the possible profit. Arrival of fans, sale of tickets. Ukrainian fans now have almost no opportunity to leave. I do not rule out that the referees at the match with Italy were of a low level - they were given a command, they complied,"

Pustovoy added that the representatives of FIBA \u200b\u200bcowards have never called the events in Ukraine a war.

" Don't call a spade a spade. Never called the war in Ukraine a war. Underpants. Due to the fact that FIBA \u200b\u200bbanned T-shirts, the day before the game (with Italy - ed.). ) made posters. We took pictures, made a video.

We wanted to remind people about the crimes of Russia by Independence Day. Plus - there were also Ukrainian children at the match who came to support us - they had a training camp in Riga. During the game, they were sitting with these posters,"

Recall that the Russian woman Natalya Galkina, who for 10 years held the position of Secretary General of the Basketball Federation of Russia, is moving to work in the FIBA \u200b\u200bcentral office. This decision outraged representatives of the Basketball Federation of Ukraine.