OPALS coach Carrie Graf insists Newcastle basketballers Jenni Screen and Suzy Batkovic are still in the mix for the 2012 London Olympic Games, despite missing selection for Australia's FIBA world championship defence in the Czech Republic next month.
Batkovic, a 2004 and 2008 Olympian, was unavailable due to her own knee injury and an illness in her family and Screen was omitted from the 13-player squad named two weeks ago.
Screen and Laura Summerton, teammates at the 2008 Beijing Olympics and in Australia's world championship-winning team at Brazil in 2006, will accompany the Opals for warm-up tournaments in New York and Spain.
That squad leaves next Tuesday and Graf and the coaching staff will use the tour to trim the team to 12 for the world titles, which begin on September 23.
"It is tough," Graf told the Newcastle Herald.
"Through the course of Opals history, very good players - players who have been Olympians and to world championships - miss out.
"We have to make selections and unfortunately for Screeny, that was her this time around.
"We felt there's some emerging talent that has really stepped up to the plate and we see as part of this campaign and down the track. But as always we keep good people in the mix and if there's injury or things change, anything can happen in a year and two years down the track."
Graf said the 28-year-old guard handled the disappointment of her omission with class.
In Batkovic's absence, the Opals included emerging low-post players Liz Cambage, Marianna Tolo and Abby Bishop for their first senior world championships.
"Suzy didn't make herself available for this process and that was another factor for us to take the young 'bigs'," Graf said.
"There's a starting post position right there and Suzy's a legit six [feet] five [inches], six-six and we felt that we had to go with the size factor, particularly with Suzy out of that mix. But she's certainly still got aspirations to be a part of the Opals beyond this campaign.
"This will be the first time ever that the Opals will be bigger than say the US, or Russia . . . That's the now generation of young post players - they've got legitimate international size.
"We could have selected another way and been happy with that but . . . we feel this is the best team for right now and in particular looking towards 2012 as well, because that young big talent is something that we haven't had before."
Graf, an Opals assistant coach at the 1996 and 2000 Olympics, succeeded Jan Stirling as head coach in December 2008.
Stirling believed Screen and Summerton should have been retained for Australia's world title defence and though Graf said she was unaware of those comments, respected Stirling for expressing that opinion.
"There's always going to be varying opinions and people who have been there before and been a part of it and rightly so, because people that care about it have an opinion about it," she said.
"It's a competitive, elite sport that we're talking about - world championships and Olympics - and that's what makes the selections hard.
"The people that miss out work harder or go away and add something to their game and have that burning passion to be a part of it again.
"Great players, good players, players that have been a part of it, miss out on every world championship and Olympic selection . . . It's in every code and unfortunately it hurts a lot when it's a world championships or an Olympic team."
"It's not the fun part of being the national head coach but it also speaks volumes for the depth of talent that we've got, when people like Screen and Summerton don't make it."
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