FOX (DR) / France TV (DR)

On the occasion of this 33rd edition of the Olympic Games, LeBron James and his teammates from Team USA have decided not to reside in the Olympic village intended for athletes.

A choice that does not please everyone, especially Nelson Monfort, who is very critical of the American selection and its superstar from the Lakers.

The competition will be tighter than ever this year, but Team USA is still the big favorite in basketball.

After the fiasco of the last World Cup, the Americans did not want to take any risks and therefore sent the cream of the crop to Paris with LeBron James , Stephen Curry and Kevin Durant to bring the team to a fifth consecutive Olympic gold medal. A terrifying armada.

True to their ambitions, US athletes want to sweep the board and to do so, they do not hesitate to go against the grain of trends to do what they think is best.

In this case, and like Novak Djokovic, who justified himself on this subject , the basketball players decided not to sleep in the Olympic village but in a five-star hotel in Lille.

A measure decried by the legendary Nelson Monfort on the set of C dans l’air .

In the middle of the Olympics, Nelson Monfort’s rant

Nelson Monfort : I’m not a big fan of these billionaire athletes [LeBron James is the only billionaire in the competition, editor’s note] who come to participate in the Olympic Games.

(…) Are you kidding? There are a lot of them! The Dream Team – I already find that word quite pretentious – this American basketball team that doesn’t stay in the Olympic village… You can imagine that these are people who stay in 4 or 5 star hotels, I know a Parisian hotel manager who receives some very famous athletes.

The Olympic Games are one and the same event, one and the same family.

What are we asking for? We are asking for 16 days together, not four years together!

I find that this mixture, there is something that I do not like. (…) The Olympic Games are a family, and we are asking this family to stay together for 16 days and to be in the same conditions.

Monfort also attacks the representatives of sport and tennis, but it is mainly those of Team US who are subject to his wrath here.

Let us recall, however, that on the purely practical side, residing in the Olympic village is of little interest to American basketball players.

The group stages actually take place in Lille and not in Paris (1 hour by train).

There is also the problem of the facilities deemed insufficient, on which Kevin Durant has already expressed himself …

For Nelson Monfort, it is intolerable that the Team USA basketball players do not set down their suitcases in the Olympic village and he does not appreciate their elitist side due to their wealth. On the other hand, it has become a tradition for the US selection to settle elsewhere during the Olympics… and if they get more comfort from it, we understand why.