Βy Aris Barkas / info@eurohoops.net
Milan got a key win in Belgrade, however, Crvena Zvezda is still on playoffs course, and coach Giannis Sfairopoulos wants his team and the fans to focus on making history by entering the Turkish Airlines EuroLeague playoffs for the first time.
Coach Sfairopoulos was really tense in the press conference that followed the game, explaining the situation: “It’s unrealistic to think about Dubai. We will try our best to go to the playoffs first, to have our first win in the playoffs. We will have for this, we have the dream to go to Dubai, but are we favorites to go? We don’t have in our history a playoffs win, and they come here and they say, ‘Dubai, Dubai”. Ok, I want to be an F1 driver! I will be tomorrow!”
It has to be noted that the EuroLeague Final Four is going to be held in Abu Dhabi, but Sfairopoulos reacted to a chant by the fans that was heard during the game. According to some Serbian media, the fans were not chanting “Dubai” but “Pumpaj”, a Serbian word that means “keep pumping” and had become one of the chants used in the recent protests following the railway station canopy collapse in the city of Novi Sad.
However, the message of coach Sfairopoulos is clear: “We still have five games left, and we’ll fight until the end to qualify for the playoffs. We have a big future ahead of us, so support the team”.
A bit later, coach Sfairopoulos sent the same message to Zvezda fans via his social media.