Interview with Seychelles Basketball Federation chairman Terry Celeste |06 December 2017

‘Our biggest challenge is refereeing’

The 2017 basketball season ended two weeks ago with the Seychelles Basketball Federation (SBF) Cup finals won by Beau Vallon Heat (men) and B Challenge (women), while Premium Cobras and Mont Fleuri are the men’s and women’s league champions.

After taking over the SBF chairmanship in May 2017, Terry Celeste, a former Beau Vallon and national team player, is satisfied with the work the federation has been doing.

Sports NATION met him last week and he spoke about his wish to see local basketball reach the next level and even make a break on the international scene.

Seychelles NATION: How would you describe the season?

Terry Celeste: On the whole, the season has been satisfactory as we have been able to complete our calendar without major incident.  We also had eight young male and female players who took part in the African 3v3 Young Lions Cup tournament in Botswana. The male team finished as runners-up which is a very good performance.

Seychelles NATION: Are you satisfied with the way things have gone?

Terry Celeste: There is still a lot of work to be done for us to be able to run the game better. For example, the National Basketball Technical Committee (NBTC) has to become more reliable. It has to improve on sending out letters to teams early to avoid any unwanted situations, work out the fixtures so that teams don’t sit out for two or three weeks between matches. We also lack referees and the level of refereeing needs to improve. These are some of the things we will concentrate more on and correct next year.

Seychelles NATION: What has been the most challenging issue for the federation?

Terry Celeste: Referees. Our biggest challenge in basketball is refereeing. We do not have the number of referees required. We are going to advertise for more referees and as you know we have a small pool of young referees and we will target other young people to join refereeing. But I am happy to say that no matches were cancelled due to non-availability of referees as it had been the case in the past. Some matches started late because referees arrived late, but no matches were cancelled.

Seychelles NATION: What about the quality of refereeing which at times has been the subject of complaint by team managers and players?

Terry Celeste: We listened to and took on board positive critics. But we left the negative ones aside. There have been some bad calls by referees and we are trying to bring international expert referees to work with our referees three months prior to the start of the league. There are also Seychellois international referees who boast a lot of experience and we want to bring them onboard, if they are interested, to train our referees. We can offer them the opportunity to follow further overseas instructors referees’ courses so they can act as referee instructors with the federation. This will be our target for next year. We have some good and quality referees around but they lack concentration.

Seychelles NATION: What do you have to say about the reactions of spectators towards referees?

Terry Celeste: The spectators need to be educated on the rules of basketball and this also applies to players and members of team management. A lot of people involved with basketball are not well versed with the rules that keep changing now and then.  The spectators are even worse. They are not at all well versed with basketball rules and they get excited when the referees make their calls. There are calls by referees which are good calls but are considered as bad calls by spectators. The rules of the game keep changing and the spectators should keep abreast with the changes. This is why spectators don’t agree with the referees’ decisions and this is out of ignorance. As a result, this can create a lot of disturbances at matches. For example, there is a third step in basketball nowadays. It’s new, and for some spectators and teams that’s travelling violation. We need to use the media to educate them about the game’s rules that keep changing.

Seychelles NATION: Any unpleasant incident?

Terry Celeste: We had only one incident that I can recall. It was a fight during a first division match and two players were banned. Players on both benches left their respective bench to intervene and as we did not want to ban the two teams from competition, it was decided to fine them R1,500 each.

Seychelles NATION: As you know, the Indian Ocean Island Games are around the corner. Has the teams’ preparation started?

Terry Celeste: We started our preparation this year and now we will take a break as we are re-organising everything within the federation and the National Sports Council has just provided us with two international basketball experts ‒ Serbian brothers Filip and Andrija Golubovic ‒ to work with us. The training for both the men’s and women’s national teams will be in full swing as of January 2018. We also have our male under-18 national team who are currently training for next year’s Afro-Basket 2018 and we will start a training programme for the female under-18 year-olds in January. Training for national teams will be high up on our programme for next year.

Seychelles NATION: How would you describe the level of basketball played here?

Terry Celeste: The level of basketball has improved a lot. This is especially true for the men’s division one as there are more quality teams than in the past. Because the level of competition has gone up, more teams are winning the league title compared to the past years when only two teams sat at the top. A strong team like Premium Cobras took 11 years to reclaim the league title and with second division champions Bel Ombre Marlins winning promotion to the top flight, there will be tougher competition in the first division.  But the federation has to also work to raise the level of women’s basketball. We have had only four women’s teams in the league for a long time and even though it will be difficult to materialise, we have to try to at least have another women’s team in the league in future.  We will work to increase the number of teams in the school league. This is where both young male and female players can be identified for further training to replace retired players. 

Seychelles NATION: Anything else you want to add?

Terry Celeste:  What I like with the federation is that we are working together collectively. The coaches’ commission, NBTC and the executive meet to discuss, to seek solutions where we went wrong this year and look what we have to improve one and set targets for the next year. We will by the way organise a basketball forum on the way forward for all stakeholders by mid-December. We want to relook at the SBF constitution, bring in new ideas that will bring basketball to the next level. We are also opening up the federations with others in the Indian Ocean region and worldwide through the Fédération internationale de Basketball Association (Fiba). We have embarked on a marketing strategy to promote our federation locally and internationally, this will enable Seychelles’ basketball to be recognised worldwide. With the completion of the renovation work on the Victoria Gymnasium, we will be able to organise international competitions. We want basketball to be lively and popular.

Interview conducted by P. J.