Ben Gordon to Play for England in 2011

BG tells the Detroit Free Press that he’ll be donning a British jersey next summer in the Euro Championships: “While continuing his rehabilitation from off-season ankle surgery, Gordon made a whistle-stop visit across the Atlantic on Thursday to pledge his allegiance to Great Britain, vowing to play for the national team next summer. Gordon, 27, was born in London. ‘I moved to New York when I was 10 months old,’ he said. ‘I would visit every summer when I was younger to visit my dad. But when I started to play competitively, I stopped coming, because summer’s the time when you get better.’ Gordon reconnected with his extended family two years ago on a journey back to the British capital. His father, Howard, has since moved to Africa, but there was a new set of relatives to meet who had only previously seen him, late at night, on the infrequent TV screenings of the NBA in a country where basketball is not a major sport — and where he could walk down most streets unrecognized … Basketball is the only sport where the host nation does not receive an automatic bid at the Olympics. But the influence of Chicago Bulls forward Luol Deng — and a mix of Europe-based veterans and American college prospects — has strengthened the case for an invite to the London Games in 2012. That is one of the major attractions for Gordon to get on board. ‘Just to participate in an Olympics is special enough, but to play it here in 2012, in the country I was born,’ he said. ‘It would be amazing to play against the U.S. And to beat them.”‘