Yanai: "The Association chairman approached me with the goal of naturalizing Oturu"

The owner of Hapoel Tel Aviv, Ofer Yanai, shared a video this evening (Sunday) on his Instagram account in which he claimed that the heads of the Basketball Association asked to naturalize Hapoel Tel Aviv center, Dan Oturu. In addition, he explained why the move that had already begun to take shape did not ultimately come to fruition, and the center did not take part in the Israel national team squad.

"I landed in Hong Kong ahead of a week full of meetings and thought it was time I shared something that has been weighing on me for a few months. A few months ago, the Association approached us through Amos Frishman and said something that was pleasing from our perspective - that the Association is interested in Dan Oturu as the next naturalized player, however, this requires some changes from their point of view."

"One of the significant changes was that we ensure the contract has no buy-out clause," Yanai continued. "He is a sought-after player and players like him want that flexibility, so it was not simple to organize it, but I made sure to handle it. The cost of the change was something like two million dollars. The Association took the trouble to note that it needed to be for the upcoming campaign, the one that has already been played, and then, miraculously, things were delayed."

"According to my understanding and messages I received from people who are there in the back rooms, people from Maccabi Tel Aviv and Maccabi Herzliya came and said no - let's change the rules. For decades, naturalized players gave an advantage to the team the naturalized player played for, and that was fine as long as it was Maccabi Tel Aviv or Hapoel Jerusalem, but if it is Hapoel Tel Aviv, then it suddenly does not fit."