Olympiacos heart beats in Paris
Olympiacos delegation is leaving Tuesday afternoon (15.00) from the “Eleftherios Venizelos” heading to Paris. In a second consecutive Final Four, the “red and whites” want to make one step more, at first qualifying to the final and then challenging the trophy. The reds are leaving one day earlier due to the general strike in Greece, they trained in morning at the Renti facilities and on Wednesday at 13.00 they will train for the first time on French ground.
Coach Giannakis spoke about yesterday and now: “Having played at a Final Four helps you for sure for the next time, you know things better and this knowledge can be negative if you don’t put into good use. Partizan is a hard player, they use pressure to make you play nervous, so that you cloud your thinking and you lose your patience. Our rival has an alibi even if they lose, they don’t have any pressure or stress and they have taken excellent advantage of all of them up to now. Our fans are entitled to be there and enjoy the experience. We are all going there to enjoy it”.
The head of Olympiacos technical staff spoke about the large number of fans that are going to travel to Paris: “This year our fans have helped us very much and they haven’t put pressure on us. Even in games when we were trailing and the situation hadn’t been good, the fans helped us recover and get the victory. Our fans have understood that the score is not important at 15’, or at 25’ or even at 35’”.
The most experienced “red and white”, the man that has made playing at a Final Four a… habit, is Teo Papaloukas: “It’s very difficult to play Aris in their home court, even when they don’t have many fans with them like tonight. In the first half, Aris imposed his game, put us to sleep, it was just a repetition of the game in the Peace and Friendship Stadium. In the 2nd half, we showed we have character and got an important victory”, the captain stressed and then he was asked on whether the games against Aris are going to be of help in view of the Final Four:”I’ll tell you next Monday. We are in a good way, but we have to be ready on Friday and not now”.
As for the Serbs? “Partizan has the chance to write history, we have to watch out and use their inexperience. We know we are going to have about 5.000 fans in Paris. The fans always help us and have never put stress on us. I wish Paris is full with Olympiacos fans”.
Finally, Milos Teodosic pointed: “We made one more victory and we are going to Paris without having in mind a third game against Aris. We are now only looking at the semi final against Partizan and we know very well that we cannot underestimate it at any moment. As it became obvious through the season, any team that did that, paid the dearly and we cannot become the next team in the same line. We are in a very good condition at the moment, both playing wise and mentally, but we have to put our heads down, work hard in the next three days and show ourselves in the best possible condition at the semi final”.