The Irish women’s basketball team would lose a “generation of players” were they to boycott their EuroBasket qualifier against Israel, says Basketball Ireland CEO John Feehan.

Ireland are due to play Israel in the Latvian capital Riga on Thursday.

There have been calls for Ireland to boycott the game given the ongoing Israel-Gaza war.

Speaking to RTE, external, Feehan said Basketball Ireland would face heavy sanctions if they did not fulfil the fixture.

According to Feehan, Basketball Ireland were told by governing body Fiba Europe that they would be fined 80,000 euros (£68,201) if they did not play on Thursday and a further 100,000 euros (£85,245) fine if they did not fulfil the return game in November.

Ireland would also face expulsion from the Fiba Women’s EuroBasket 2025 competition.

“I’m pretty sure we’d be hit pretty hard because we did actually ask was there an alternative to playing this game and all the rest of it, and from that perspective there isn’t,” said Feehan.

Feehan added that “money is everything” to an organisation like Basketball Ireland.

“But the really big issue for us is we’d be effectively getting rid of a generation of players. We’d be out of international competition for the next five years effectively.

“Not only would we be out of international competition for the next five years but it would probably take us another five years to get back to where we are now, so in real terms we’d lose a generation of players.

“We’d also lose role models for our kids as they go through the process of learning to play basketball, there’d be nowhere to go.”