A 16-year-old player told The Times that Bamba sexually assaulted her at the 2020 U-18 African championships held last December in Egypt. While the team trained in Mali before the tournament, the player said, Bamba threatened to expel her from the team when she refused to join him in the shower or in his bed. But during the tournament, she said, Bamba entered her hotel room one night at 2 a.m., forced her to touch him then touched her breasts and tried to reach beneath her underwear. She said she fled when a teammate knocked on the door.
The player’s father confirmed his daughter’s description of the assault to The Times and to Human Rights Watch. The father said that his daughter quit playing basketball, having grown traumatized and withdrawn.
An 18-year-old player told The Times that Bamba assaulted her when she was 16 at the 2019 U-19 Women’s World Cup held in Thailand. He…
