Mies, October 8: India will be hosting the 3x3 basketball qualifiers for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics in March next year, basketball world governing body FIBA has announced. The tournament will feature 40 teams (20 in each gender), the location for which will be announced later. Six tickets (three per gender) to next year Olympics will be awarded at the olympic qualifying tournament, said FIBA in a press release.

"It is a great honour to host such an important event in India and to see our players give it all on home soil for a berth to the first-ever 3x3 Olympic tournament," said Basketball Federation of India (BFI) President Govindaraj Kempareddy. Tokyo Olympics 2020: Bibhu Kalyan Nayak of Odisha Becomes First Indian Medical Officer for Olympics.

"We are delighted to host the Olympic qualifying tournament in India", FIBA Secretary General Andreas Zagklis said.

"Following the successful organisation of two consecutive FIBA Women's Asia Cup in Bangalore by the BFI, we are looking forward to organising now a key 3x3 event in a country where our new Olympic discipline already has a strong fanbase."

In addition to the host teams, the remaining of the 40 participating teams are qualified via the FIBA rankings and the results of the FIBA World Cup held in Amsterdam.

On June 9, 2017, 3x3 was added to the Olympic Program and the discipline will be making its Olympic debut in Japan next year where eight-team tournaments will be held for men and women.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Oct 08, 2019 12:20 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).