By Eurohoops team / info@eurohoops.net
Greek Basketball Federation president Giorgos Vasilakopoulos spoke to newspaper ‘To Vima’ addressing the controversy of three Olympiacos’ players sending a letter in which they expressed their uneasiness with the current events in the Greek NT.
Olympiacos players felt they were brought into a complicated situation with Rick Pitino taking head coach duties both in Panathinaikos OPAP and the Greek national team and proceeded with the aforementioned statement. Vasilakopoulos stated that this has not been actually written by the players in his recent interview.
“The letter has not been written by the players themselves and it’s wrong to undermine the NT for the sake of other interests. The players have their own personalities and opinions in order not to get carried away by anyone”, he mentions. “I don’t think it’s worth worrying about. All three players will surely re-evaluate their stance and be present for the NT next summer”.
Accordingly, the Secretary-General of the Greek ministry of sports, Giorgos Mavrotas, talked about the “toxic environment” players are exposed to.
“The national team does not belong to the Federation President nor the coach. We have to take this out of the fans’ minds. When someone coaches a club it does not mean he cannot work for the NT. I think that all three Olympiacos players wouldn’t have an issue to be coached by Rick Pitino if it wasn’t for this toxic environment”.