Serbian-Australian basketball instructor Jelena Todorovic intends to be greater than simply the first female mentoring a male team in Brazil, as she works with reversing the lot of money of players who finished bottom of the table last season.
The 31 -year-old, newly in charge of the Fortaleza squad in northeastern Brazil, is prepping hard for the nation’s elite males’s basketball championship which begins in October.
It is no easy task: the club was dead last in 2024
“I do not want to be just the initial lady. I wish to be somebody who left a mark,” Todorovic informed AFP.
“I want to be someone who made this team much better, that made my gamers much better, and I want my results to represent themselves.”
Todorovic that arrived in Brazil in August played for Red Celebrity Belgrade, a leading club back home, prior to coming to be a trainer at age 20
She dealt with the club level in Australia before signing up with the coaching personnel of males’s nationwide groups in Serbia, Spain and Greece where she trained celebrity Giannis Antetokounmpo, that has actually given that become a two-time champion of one of the most Valuable Player award in the US National Basketball Association.
It is the NBA which most motivates Todorovic, notably former player Becky Hammon, the first lady aide instructor in the organization.
In December 2020, Hammon became the very first and just female head coach in the NBA for a solitary regular period game, when San Antonio Spurs head train Gregg Popovich was sent off throughout a game versus the Los Angeles Lakers.
“Becky Hammon was just one of the initial, largest, motivations for me since as a little girl, I didn’t have lots of people to respect, someone that resembled me,” said Todorovic.
“So, having her there as a trendsetter … was extremely inspiring, and it gave me the additional motivation to follow my desires.”
In the country where football is king, she wants to spark an enthusiasm for basketball, which she calls a “faith” in Serbia.
“I didn’t doubt for a second coming to Brazil. I accepted it straight away due to the fact that I really appreciate the brand-new challenges, like concerning a new culture, a brand-new basketball ambience.”
She said her desire is to produce such a brand-new basketball eagerness in Fortaleza.
And if, along the road, “I’ve influenced one woman to take my path, my task is done.”
Brazil has one of the toughest basketball customs in South America, and the top males’s organization, the Novo Basquete Brasil progressively draws in international gamers and trains.
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