Slam dunk: Injured foot likely to sideline Breakers' star for most of the month

By PETER JESSUP

The Breakers' star player Pero Cameron looks unlikely to be in action before the end of this month.

His foot injury is taking time to repair and that has kept him out of heavy training, although his knee injury appears to have improved.

The Breakers play away to the Wollongong Hawks on Saturday, with 2.04m forward Blake Truslove back to take some of the attention away from Ben Melmeth, who collected early fouls that restrained him during the loss in Cairns.

Truslove resumed full training on Monday after missing the first two games with a broken bone in his hand. But Cameron's foot is still sore and he is being assessed by the team medics daily with the aim of making a start some time this month.

The toughness of the Breakers' schedule has hit home early, with three hours' sleep after their home victory over Adelaide before the players lined up at Auckland Airport for an 11-hour journey to Cairns.

They have a double-header away to Adelaide, then Victoria Giants, on October 24 to 25, then host Cairns at Wellington on October 31 and in Auckland a day later.

The Hawks include Wellington Saints import Ben Knight and Boomers guard Glen Saville, their import Darnell Mee scoring 35 in the side's 131-108 win over the Hunter Pirates.

Saturday night's game will be live on Sky 2, but there is no arrangement yet to provide free-to-air cover, delayed or otherwise, for the away games, with TV2 so far committed only to the home contests.

The Melbourne Tigers, who play at the North Shore Events Centre on Sunday night, October 19, have signed Canadian national player Dave Thomas.

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The Breakers flew in from Cairns just in time for forward Dillon Boucher to witness the birth of his second child, Makenzee, a sister for 2-year-old Jayden. New baby and mum Nikki both well.

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China are the last nation to make the Athens Olympics competition for men, joining New Zealand and Australia (Oceania) - the Tall Blacks because of their placing in the 2002 world champs and the Boomers as Oceania champs - the United States, Argentina and Puerto Rico (qualified at Americas tournament); Spain, Lithuania and Italy (European qualifiers); Angola (Africa); Serbia and Montenegro (formerly Yugoslavia) as world champions; and Greece as hosts.

The giant Houston Rockets forward Yao Ming scored 30 as the Chinese beat South Korea 106-06 at Harbin.

The New Zealand and Australian women (Oceania) will be joined in Athens by Brazil (Americas), Russia, the Czech Republic and Spain (Europe), Greece as hosts and the US as world champs, with the final four of 12 teams to be decided at the Asia championships (three) and African tournament (one).

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Tall Black Mark Dickel scored 14, had eight rebounds, seven assists and three steals as his new club Oostende opened its account in the Belgian national league with a 105-78 thrashing of Groot Leuven.

Tall Fern Megan Compain shot 28 as her new Welsh side Rhondda Rebels beat the Ellesmere Port Panthers 73-62 in the British league.

Compain played all 40 minutes, took five rebounds and five steals and gave five assists.

In Australia, her team-mate Aneka Kerr scored 10 as her Townsville side lost to Adelaide 59-56 and Rebecca Cotton shot five in 18 minutes, grabbed six rebounds and a steal, and provided four assists in her debut for the Sydney Flames as they downed Adelaide 69-56.