Opals coach Sandy Brondello admits she doesn’t know whether we will see WNBA star Liz Cambage playing for Australia again.
Cambage withdrew from the squad weeks before the start of the Olympics, citing mental health issues.
It came following an alleged physical and verbal altercation with Nigerian players at training camp in Las Vegas.
Opals players reportedly asked for Cambage to be taken out of the squad following the incident.
However, the basketball side’s Olympic campaign never really got going, losing to Belgium and China before being blown off the court by Team USA in the quarter finals.
“I’m unsure. I really don’t know,” Brondello told Channel Seven after the game when asked if Cambage would wear green and gold ever again.
“I’m just disappointed for those 12 players in there at the moment and we’ll look forward to the future in a few weeks.
“We’ve got the World Cup in Sydney next year and we’ll be really motivated for that.
“We’re obviously disappointed. We faced a red-hot USA team today, but look I’m proud of the girls, we’ve handled so much adversity these last few weeks.
“We had to try and find our game without our dominant player on the fly. We didn’t play to our best we needed more time, but I’m still proud of their effort and the way they stuck together.”
Brondello added that the loss of the four-time WNBA All-Star impacted the team significantly on the court, but also mentally fatigued the group.
“(Losing Cambage) wasn’t easy. I think I was pretty drained, to be quite honest,” Brondello told News Corp.
“It’s hard as a coach when you prepare to have a player in and at the last minute it’s taken out, especially with the limited preparation we had.
“Liz, she’s one of the best players in the world,” Brondello continued.
“We took a big player out, and we’ve just got to find the best way that we can play and learn from every experience we have moving forward.”