Papadopoulos: “Every victory is now a success for the Youth National Team”

The National Youth Men’s National Team is among the eight best teams in Europe and everyone had the chance to enjoy it, but for a while, since the next big match is coming, on Thursday in the quarter-finals of the European U20 in Heraklion.

“The game was very dangerous from too many sides and for the qualification, but also because the opposing team is a very well-worked team, dangerous. We didn’t start well. The positive thing was that again we told the dressing room about some mistakes and discussed and entered the second half more energetically, got a lead and kept it until the end. We are happy now, but as soon as we leave the field we focus on tomorrow’s game“, he said the coach of the team, Kostas Papadopoulos. As for the continuation and the quarter-finals, he emphasized that “every game and every win from now on will be a success” to conclude: “We said it before with the kids, we have made a bet…».

THE Nikos Plotas played his part in qualifying, mainly through his defence. For the same Greek guard, however, the world was important. “It was a tremendous effort from the whole team in the second half. We came in focused, we played defense before everything else, we had the right options in attack and the result came“, pointed out the ace of Prometheus and referring to Iceland added: “Iceland are certainly very dangerous, perhaps the most dangerous team in the tournament. Maybe because it’s their style, they’re a run and gun team. We had scouted well, played good defense like I said and our passion spoke». The No. 5 of the National Youth Men’s National Team is one of the players who get energy from the platform and he admitted it, thanking the crowd: “Thank you people first of all. His support was very important. Thank you very much, because he pushed me to play the defense that I did and we want him in the next match with us». The next match will be against Turkey or Montenegro: “We have to go in focused. We forget about today from now on, we prepare for tomorrow and go for the four».

THE Sotiris Economopoulos he was another player who gave a lot from the region. He was the top scorer of the Greek team with 18 points and also had 6 rebounds and 3 assists. He’s already seeing… tomorrow: “We are focused on the next game. This… We are happy today, but that ends as soon as we go to the hotel, because tomorrow we have an important game. Iceland were a dangerous team, we had seen it, they have played against almost all their opponents and we were not focused at the beginning. In the second half we showed up ready and won». But he also has his request for the platform:The crowd is amazing every time and we are asking for a bigger turnout for tomorrow’s game which is even more important».