A Contingent comprising 15 schoolgirls will leave the country this Friday to take part in the 1st FIBA Asian under 16 Basketball Championship which will be worked off from 28th November to 7th December at Pune, India.

The tournament is organised and conducted by Federation of International Basketball Association for the first time.

12 countries are taking part in this tournament and are pooled into two groups. China, Chinese Taipei, Singapore, Philippines, Hong Kong and India are included in group A while Korea, Japan, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Thailand and Kasakastan make the teams in Group B.

In the first round, the teams will play matches in a round robin basis. The top two teams in each group will qualify for the semi finals of the tournament.

The Sri Lankan team players have been selected by Sri Lanka Basketball Federation under the supervision of Sri Lanka School Basketball Association. The players are from St.Joseph’s College Nugegoda, Holy Family Convent Dehiwala, Bishop College, Sirimavo Bandaranaiake College, Dharmasoka College Ambalangoda, St.Lawrence’s College Colombo 6,Maliyadewa Balika Vidyalaya, Holy Family Convent Kurunegala, Overseas International school of Colombo and Janadhipathi Balika Vidyalaya.

Shayami Adikari of Holy Family convent is acting as the team Manager while Prasanna Jayasinghe is the team’s coach. The assistant coach is Susil Udukumbura.