Manu Ginobili rates the United States as one of the favourites to win this year's FIBA World Championship, but the Argentina guard insists the days of Team USA dominance are "part of the past".

Speaking in Singapore, where Olympic champions Argentina will be competing in the Philips Singapore Cup this weekend against Spain, Slovenia and defending world champions Serbia & Montenegro, Ginobili believes the gap in the talent level between US basketball and the rest of the world is gradually diminishing.

"I don't think you're ever going to see again a US team that beats everyone else by a big margin. That was 15 years ago or whenever it was," said the San Antonio Spurs guard.

"Now basketball has changed and many of us are playing with them [in the NBA] every single day so we're getting closer.

"So you're not going to see a US team, even though they are very good, beating everyone else by 30 points. That's part of the past."

However, given the talent at the Americans' disposal, Ginobili is not about to write off their chances of regaining their FIBA World Championship crown although he believes that much will depend on their team chemistry in Japan.

"We know that they have a lot of young talent but we don't know how they will play together. We'll only know that when the World Championship starts," he added.

"Of course the United States will always be among the favourites because of the talent that they have like LeBron James, Dwayne Wade and Carmelo Anthony.

"However, basketball is about the team, it's not only about the players. As long as they play together, they play good defence and they play as a team, then they're going to have a big chance of winning it."

As for his own team, Ginobili is confident that Argentina are hitting form at just the right time as they seek to win their first World Championship since their triumph at the inaugural tournament in 1950.

"Of course the first couple of weeks [of training] were hard because everybody was rusty and trying to get back into shape and getting used to playing with each other again," said Ginobili.

"We're now playing in the same way that we want to be at the World Championship.

"We're looking forward to starting already, and playing this weekend against Serbia, Slovenia and Spain, who are going to be three of the most important teams at the World Championship, is very important to us.

"Every time we play, we want to win, that's for sure. It may be the World Championship, the Olympics, the NBA Championship or the South American Championship, but we always want to win."

Argentina face Serbia & Montenegro in their opening game of the Philips Singapore Cup on Friday evening, before taking on Slovenia on Saturday and Spain on Sunday at the Singapore Indoor Stadium.

Article courtesy of www.fiba.com