Yesterday Yao gave an interview in China that stated he thinks the Chinese national team needs to have “fresh blood” if they want to continue and improve, and give young players more court time to increase their experience. We already know from last year that Yao said he had played his last Olympics in the 2008 Beijing Games. So it looks like a changing of the guard is occurring before our very eyes.

In the YaoMania forum, Raymond reports Yao will be cheering on his Chinese teammates when they play exhibition games against Australian national team in Beilun of Ningbo June 28-30th.

Before that, though, he will be flying back to Houston on Sunday June 21st for the scheduled medical checkup on his foot. It will be a short trip, though, since he will return to China sometime next week for a summer camp sponsored by China Life for orphans and child survivors of the Sichuan earthquake in Beijing.

This entry was posted on Friday, June 19th, 2009 at 12:27 am and is filed under Rockets' off-season. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.