Iran, China, Philippines, Jordan head power ranking

CHANGSHA – In the lead-up to the 2015 FIBA Asia Championship, experts from the international cage body have ranked the 16 teams seeing action based on their respective player compositions and preparations for the biennial tournament.

The following are the team updates of the top four contenders for the championship – China, Iran, the Philippines and Jordan.

Iran

Fresh from dominating the 2015 Willian Jones Cup in Chinese Taipei, Iran has taken a short break before plunging into their final leg of preparations for the 2015 FIBA Asia Championship. Samad Nikkhah Bahrami is reportedly back in the fold, and coach Dirk Bauermann’s final 12-man roster looks solid from top to bottom.

China

China had a couple of surprises in its final 12-man roster, calling up Li Muhao and Guo Ailun, who were part of their Team B a few weeks ago. In exchange, favorites like Liu Xiaoyu, Yi Li, and Zou Yuchen lost out and will miss the 2015 FIBA Asia Championship. Still, coach Gong Luming has a pretty formidable team, and definitely the biggest one out there with four guys standing around 2.10m tall.

The Philippines

The Filipinos appeared to continue their steady improvement, sweeping the recently concluded MVP Cup right at home in Manila. They repeated over New Zealand club team Wellington Saints and Asian rival Chinese Taipei en route to their first formal title as a team. They’ve secluded themselves in Cebu for one week for team chemistry before heading for Changsha.

Jordan

Despite a rough start to their training about a month ago, the Jordanians have more than made up for lost time. They just concluded their participation in a four-nation pocket tournament in China, where the team won all but one of their matches and had some tune-up games in Manila with stalwarts Sam Daghlas and Zaid Abbas joining the squad. With an almost complete cast (promising big man Ahmad Al-Dwairi cannot join the team), coach Rajko Toroman looks to be readying a clear contender for the Asian crown.