Team USA star Joel Embiid is expecting a “fun” match against France for the gold medal in basketball at the Paris 2024 Olympics.
A vibrant crowd is expected to flock to the court for the final showdown between the NBA All-Stars and the host nation.
Embiid has been painted as a villain during the games after opting to represent the USA rather than France, despite asking for French citizenship in 2022.
But the 30-year-old believes he never made a promise and does not understand the negative reaction he gets from the home crowd.
Speaking ahead of the gold medal match, he said: “Frankly, I don’t understand why I’ve gotten a lot of criticism from the crowd.
“They’re going to boo me. I’m going to go back at them and tell them to ‘suck it.’ And so it’s going to be fun.”
The Golden Doubleheader: USA vs France pic.twitter.com/JTlI2iN8t6
— USA Basketball (@usabasketball) August 9, 2024
Embiid has lived in the US since he was 16 and got citizenship granted in 2023.
And his team-mates at the games, particularly the likes of LeBron James, did their part in recruiting him.
He added: “Having lived half of my life in the U.S. and the other half in my country, Cameroon, it just looked like it was, you could go two ways.
“I said, from the beginning, and everybody knew that if Cameroon would’ve qualified, that would’ve never been a choice. And then having the family [in America] and having built a lot of things and having accomplished a lot of things in the U.S. and then knowing the group of guys deeply, it just made it easy.”
Embiid has been a key player for Team USA, scoring 19 points in the semi-final win against Serbia and dealing well with NBA MVP Nikola Jokic.
He simply wants to win and that is all that is on his mind heading into the match this weekend.
He said: “I think a lot of people wanted to [make it an issue] because of storyline and all that stuff … but to me it’s whatever it takes to win to gold. So that’s what I’m focused on. It’s all about Team USA against France.”
