By Eurohoops team / info@eurohoops.net
In a recent interview with Business Online, Dimitris Itoudis was asked to comment about the fact that four VTB League teams are led by Greek coaches: “I do not understand why you need to take into account nationality. This question should be addressed to the owners. They make calls, I do not. These coaches conscientiously perform their work. There is no difference whether they came from any country”
The coach considers that nationality is completely irrelevant to sports: “Discussing someone’s nationality is a dangerous thing. Especially when you’re a journalist. I give advice, with all due respect to your work, twice to think before going in this direction. The important thing is how they respect the game, not from what country they are.”
In a day and age where hatred has taken over, Itoudis considers that there should be no discriminations: “I and my coaching staff respect all players. I think the same can be said about UNICS, Khimki and Astana. This is a very delicate matter. You need to be more careful about your words. We live in a world where bombs explode here and there, people die because of such things, and we are discussing nationalities. It is not the color of the skin that matters. You can be yellow, white or black. Professionalism is important.”
“We need to talk about basketball and basketball issues, describe how one team differs from the other from the basketball point of view, rather than point out that this one came from here, and this one from there.”
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