THE Ergkin Ataman did not particularly deal with her little final Euroleague Between Panathinaikos and Olympiacos.
At the press conference after the end of the Olympiacos – Panathinaikos match, Ergkin Ataman expressed his strong dissatisfaction with Euroleague both for the insults he received from Fenerbahce fans before Friday’s semifinals (23/5) and Final Final.
Ergkin Ataman’s statements
Speaking about tonight’s game I can say that it was a good opportunity for us and the young Greek basketball players, who have given them many opportunities in the Greek league in recent months.
Samondurov played well, as he did in the championship playoffs, he has a great perspective, but once again at the beginning of the second half he played two minutes and stayed out with five fouls, as did Nan yesterday. I have nothing to say about the match, I will just say once again that my team did a good job once again, for two consecutive years we played in the Final Four. We did not play well in the semifinals, now our goal is the Greek Championship and in Friday’s finals. We haven’t lost in the league this year, the goal is to conquer it.
Technically we bring back to Athens the fact that we need to get better defensively in some situations and we need to reduce the opportunities that give the opponent at 1vs1.
Euroleague has to think about this problem I had been with two years with people coming to the hotel before the matches with Fenerbahce. More than 200 people are strongly offended by me and my mother and I would like to say thank you the President of Fenerbahce, the Ali Koch who tried to stop them. But I want to ask Euroleague, in what kind of serious events in Europe and the world, fans can come to the hotel and offend the coach. And secondly, I want to say that everyone is talking about Giannakopoulos who entered the parquet but on which stadium you put the Olympiacos fans behind our bench while you know the problem between the two clubs.
I hope Euroleague will get more experience than this and take these situations seriously and I want to suggest something. We played in the first semifinal at 6pm. Friday at 6… We play all season, waste money to play on Friday at 6 in the semifinals? Let’s change this situation and manage these situations. If you fix them, if you make it, you can make even more money. Some of our fans did not find tickets.
And after Saturday you can prepare for the final, you can cancel the small final and make the final on Sunday. Have you ever seen two games in the playoffs, in the finals? A match in the afternoon during the week? So I hope Euroleague will gain more experience than this, because they do meetings. I hope the situations are fixed and the Final Four will become more attractive. One day to play one match, the other day the other match and the other day the final. This is my experience with the Final Four in Abu Dhabi. “