By Andy Charles

Pops Mensah-Bonsu may not be universally loved for what has been at best an inconsistent spell with the Raptors, but he has the hopes of the British basketball public on his shoulders ahead of their attempt to join the elite of the European game later this year.

The Great British team has qualified for the finals of EuroBasket for the first time and now that both Luol Deng and Ben Gordon have been taken off their roster, much of the pressure shifts to Mensah-Bonsu, who was extended a qualifying offer by the Raptors at the end of June.

PMB will be the only player with extensive NBA experience on the roster, although both Robert Archibald and Joel Freeland were drafted, and the latter is still young enough to make a go of it as well if he ever gets the chance after building his experience in Europe for a few seasons.

Unlike in Toronto, PMB is relied upon at both ends of the court by the Brits, leading their scoring in a couple of qualifying games and showing just the kind of moxie that endeared him to fans at the Rogers Center when he was given a little more playing time.

But this is bigger than just EuroBasket for Britain, since they have been tasked with actually qualifying for the Olympic Games basketball tournament in three years time.

Getting to EuroBasket was just one of the steps they needed to achieve – now they need to impress against the likes of 2008 silver medallists Spain (Pau Gasol, Jorge Garbajosa), Serbia (Nenad Krstic) and Slovenia (Primoz Brezec) in the group stage.

Basketball betting suggests that they will need a win against one of the last two teams there to keep their progress and will hope to have enough talent on the roster to do it, but it’s going to be PMB who they rely on in the main.

At least when he comes back to Toronto for exhibition games, Raptors fans will know he has been playing in some tough games to try and get his adopted country into the basketball limelight for the first time…it’s tough not to root for him from afar!

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