Kougias: “If the organized fans of Herakles do not withdraw, there will be no agreement”

After these multi-day contacts, a definitive agreement was reached regarding the viability of the project, but also the distribution of responsibilities, which each of us three shareholders will have, and following this agreement in a solemn presentation of the project under the auspices of The Mayor of Thessaloniki, Mr. Konstantinos Zervas, all three of us believed, but not only us, but also the Herakles fans, who had been suffering for decades, believed that Herakles had indeed “resurrected” and that a new golden page was beginning in its 125-year history.

While the project was enthusiastically welcomed by all the leading figures of the city of Thessaloniki, but also by the invisible supporters – fans of the historic club, as was demonstrated by the enthusiastic reception they gave me upon my return after decades to the historic Kautanzoglio, when I participated as Deputy President in the ten-year historical path of Herakles under Petros Theodoridis, the organized fans had and still have an opposing view on the entry of me and Thanasis (Tom) Papadopoulos into this historical change, considering that it insults the history of Herakles this collaboration of of three of us, where I would be the head of this project institutionally, placing at the service of the historic club my personality and my professional path, but also my struggles for the purity of football, while the corresponding and proportional to the competence of each the leading industrialist-entrepreneur Stratos Eugeniou and one of the leading Greek-American businessmen of the USA, Thanasis Papadopoulos, would do.

I don’t want to believe that this reaction is motivated, because this transformation of Herakles into a powerful administrative and financial force creates problems for the other two historical clubs of Thessaloniki, PAOK and ARIS, because it is known that the organized fans of Herakles never they acted motivated by no one, since they are the ones who supported Heracles in the last decades of his football misery.

I want to categorically state that, as long as the organized followers, because without them it is not possible to succeed in the project, do not retract their public position, I have no desire to wear down the top position I have in the legal community of Greece and make available time and money for the “resurrection” of the historical Hercules, because regardless of what my sworn enemies from the dirty football background spread about me, which I have repeatedly highlighted, to any football team I offered my personality and honest money my, they asked me to join and so in the past I saved AEK from bankruptcy during the Trochanas era, presiding over it for 1 year with victories over all their top rivals and an unbeaten run in Europe, so I saved PAS YIANIINA from collapse of, when I eliminated debts of 14,000,000 euros, built training centers and handed over to Christovasilis a team of 30 debt-free Greek footballers, which the previous year had eliminated Olympiakos in the Greek Cup and from the 4th national team was on the verge of promotion to the Super League 1, this is how I saved PAE Panachaiki from dissolution and delivered it with a training center, reconstruction of the historic stadium of Agia at a cost of 500 thousand euros and in second place in Super League 2 behind AEK, which won promotion to Super League 1 in 2015, zeroing out its debts, while those who took it over have led it to bankruptcy 3 times to date, but I also saved PAE AEL from dissolution, while it did not have a single footballer, and handed it over to Mr. Davelis with 32 Greek footballers, with the most modern training center and with free use of the historic ALKAZAR, which I reconstructed spending 600,000 euros, after previously spending 2,600,000 euros on rent at AEL FC ARENA, because otherwise PAE AEL would have to 6 years which was competing in Super League 1, to give its matches in Volos, a particularly humiliating fact for its modern history.

I want to emphasize that, as I agreed yesterday with Thanasis (Tom) Papadopoulos, the announcement of the organized fans affects us personally and following this, if these offensive announcements are not withdrawn within the next few days, our agreement with Mr. Stratos Evgeniou no longer exists.

I am particularly saddened, because what all these thousands of invisible fans of Heracles of Thessaloniki are expecting, is impossible to realize, and I wish Mr. Stratos Eugeniou to be able to deal with the huge legal problems that have arisen with court decisions in the best possible way, but and with the Licensing Directorate of the EPO, as far as the enormous financial cost, which is a condition for the achievement of Heracles’ competitive goals.

I am happy to have met him, as I am also happy to have met this wonderful man, Thanasis (Tom) Papadopoulos. I am sure that even without us this huge association will find its way, but a necessary condition is peace between its institutional and extra-institutional bodies, as well as the respect of all those who have really offered in the past and wish to offer selflessly in the future.

Athens, 20/04/2023

Yours sincerely