It was announced on Friday that a US team featuring NBA players like LeBron James, Kobe Bryant and Dwayne Wade will play two exhibition games in China for the first time in August.

Injured Houston Rockets center Yao Ming is hopeful that he'll recover in time to join the Chinese team, according to Li Yuanwei, president of the Chinese Basketball Association (CBA).

Doctors have suggested that Yao, who broke his left foot on April 10 in Utah, not play any games until August 1. Despite his injuries, Yao joined his teammates in a training session on Saturday, the first time since returning to China last month.

In the latest six warm-ups in Italy, China only managed to clinch two wins, beating Venezuela 78-73 and Japan 80-75.

Former NBA player Wang Zhizhi dominated the series while Yao was out of action. Wang averaged 23 points and 9.8 rebounds and was the top scorer for China in five games. He netted 44 points in the game with Japan, which broke the highest scoring record held by Yao, who scored 39 points in a match against New Zealand at the 2004 Athens Olympics.

Commenting on Wang's performance, China's head coach Jonas Kaslauskas said that Yao controls the inside play with his strength and good physical condition, but Wang isn't as robust although he has the ability to score from behind the three-point line.

Kaslauskas said Italy and France didn't field the best lineups for the warm-ups, each team with four to five usual starters on the DNP (Did Not Play) roster.

"Of course, we didn't have Li Nan and Yao Ming," he added, "but our defeats can be attributed mainly to our poor defense."

After returning to Beijing, Kaslauskas adjusted the lineup for the Chinese team by excluding centers Tang Zhengdong and Hu Ke, calling up instead point guards Xie Libin, best rookie of the 2005-06 CBA season, and Chen Jianghua from the second team of the Guangdong Southern Tigers, who bagged their third consecutive CBA title early this year.

Gong Luming, manager of the China team, said that the current squad has many inside players including Yao, so the head coach is confident of under-ring play and the departure of Tang and Hu is reasonable.

Tang, 22, was not only expelled from the national team, but also lost his chance to play in the NBA's summer league that started on July 7.

According to Xia Song, Tang's agent, the 2.13m tall center had been focused on training for the national team, which delayed his response to invitations to play with the Toronto Raptors and other NBA teams. "It's too late now," Xia said.

Point guard Sun Yue from the Beijing Aoshen team, the other Chinese who was supposed to have joined the NBA draft, withdrew his application at the last minute. He will continue to play for Aoshen in the American Basketball Association (ABA) next season and wait for a more timely opportunity to join the NBA.

Standing at 2.05m, Sun is a point guard with a style of play that reminds many of the great Earvin "Magic" Johnson of the LA Lakers. A force to be reckoned with, Sun was selected for the West All-Star team in the ABA All-Star Game in February.

However, Sun's defects are as prominent as his panache. He is thin and the stats haven't been very promising: four turnovers, a 39 FGP (field goal percentage) and a 25 percent three-point shooting average per game in the ABA have stifled his game.

Having played one season in the ABA, the offense-minded Sun clashed with Kaslauskas' defense-oriented tactics, which explains why the head coach turned to Guangdong's Chen Jianghua.

Chen, slightly shorter at 1.87m and weighing 75 kg, averaged 17.8 points, 7.5 rebounds, two assists, a 52.9 FGP and a 78.6 FTP (free throw percentage) for the U-18 China team at the 2005 USA Youth Development Festival. In June 2006, he also netted a team-high of 32 points for China's youth team in a friendly with the Sydney Kings from Australia.

Chen Jianghua

"As a Chinese and a point guard, of course I hope I can play at the 2008 Olympics and pass balls to Yao Ming," Chen said. He is the fifth player from Guangdong to join the national team after Zhu Fangyu, Du Feng, Yi Jianlian and Wang Shipeng.

The US team will play China on August 7, and Brazil on August 8.

(China.org.cn by Li Xiao, July 10, 2006)