US President Donald Trump says NBA champion Golden State Warriors are no longer invited to visit the White House, after the team equivocated about meeting with the president.
Point guard and team leader Stephen Curry had repeatedly said that he did not want to meet Trump.
"Going to the White House is considered a great honor for a championship team," Trump tweeted on Saturday. "Stephen Curry is hesitating, therefore invitation is withdrawn!"
Trump also said that NFL players who protest during the national anthem should be sacked.
Winners in the major US sports leagues, as well as many collegiate champions and US Olympic medallists, have been routinely invited to the White House in a tradition going back decades.
Team officials from San Francisco Bay-based Golden State had said this week that Warriors players would need to discuss as a team whether to visit the White House.
The San Francisco Chronicle reported on Saturday that there appeared to have never been a formal invitation from the White House.
A number of athletes including fellow NBA superstar LeBron James has come to the support of Curry, labelling the President a 'bum'.
The Warriors have since released a statement on the issue.
"While we intended to meet as a team at the first opportunity we had this morning to collaboratively discuss a potential visit to the White House, we accept that President Trump has made it clear that we are not invited," the statement read.
"We believe there is nothing more American than our citizens having the right to express themselves freely on matters important to them.
"We're disappointed that we did not have an opportunity during this process to share our views or have open dialogue on issues impacting our communities that we felt would be important to raise.
"In Lieu of a visit to the White House, we have decided that we'll constructively use our trip to the nation's captain in February to celebrate equality, diversity and inclusion - the values that we'll embrace as an organization."
DPA/Newshub.
