YAKHCHALIDEHKORDI Behnam

General
PLAYING OVERSEAS
He began playing for Chinese club the Nanjing Monkey Kings in August 2019 before returning to the Islamic Republic of Iran in January 2020 to play for Shahrdari Gorgan. In June 2020 he was signed by the Rostock Seawolves in Germany. "The situation with the Chinese league was different because it was the first time I had played outside of Iran, and it took me a while to adapt to the conditions. Certainly the situation with the German league is different. There were Iranian players in China but not in Germany. Dirk Bauermann [Rostock Seawolves coach, who had also coached the Iranian national basketball team] talked to me about playing there. I had several years of experience working with Bauermann in the national team. The knowledge I have of him and the knowledge he has of me will help me a lot." (varzesh3.com, 25 Jul 2020; tehrantimes.com, 25 Jun 2020; irna.ir, 18 Jan 2020; tehrantimes.com, 31 Jul 2019)

DIFFERENT STYLES
He believes that playing professionally in the Islamic Republic of Iran, the People's Republic of China, and Germany has given him a good perspective on the different basketball styles in these countries. "The way that European teams play is different, they pay a lot of attention to teamwork, defensively and offensively, which I like. They also play physically. But in Asia, mostly in China, they play individually. I think that's the difference between European teams and other teams on different continents. I think that's the reason European countries are successful in basketball." (Rostock Seawolves YouTube channel, 10 Apr 2021)