Alafouzos to the BBC: “I chose the difficult path and not bankruptcy for Panathinaikos”

“Yiannis Alafouzos: The president of Panathinaikos criticizes the bad texts of Greek football”. This is the title of the long interview given by Yannis Alafouzos in the BBC with the “strong man” of the “green” PAE talking about… everything.

Referring both to duty which has opposite to Panathinaikoswhich he undertook having the “easy” choice of bankruptcy but choosing the… difficult path, which will lead to financial consolidation!

As well as the possibility that the “clover” had to become self-sufficient from this year itselfif he had managed to ensure his presence in the groups of the Champions League, in the matches with Braga…

At the same time, Mr. Alafouzos spoke about the violence and corruption that prevails in Greek football, making special mention of the Government and the Greek Police, who should to contribute to the enforcement of laws.

While the “strong” man of the “greens” was asked both about the … beating of Saudi Arabia in the field of football and about the lack of success of Greek football at the European level in recent years.

Yannis Alafouzou’s interview in detail:

-On whether the big contracts offered to players by Saudi Arabia will hurt European football and the smaller leagues…

“I think it’s going to hurt it quite a bit, and I think it’s going to affect a lot of small countries that are going to stop being in the spotlight.”

-For Greek football and its decline in the UEFA rankings in recent years:

“The existing corruption has played a role in this. We lost sponsors, we lost revenue and nobody cared. The truth is that there have been several incidents of violence, which corruption has contributed to. Corruption increases violence. I’m not saying that’s the only reason hooliganism exists, but when a section of fans feel their games are being stolen from them, that’s when they get upset and become violent. I also want to say that corruption has resulted in many Greek footballers going abroad”.

-On how to deal with corruption and, by extension, violence:

“The best way to do this is through complete transparency. With VAR and digital media in general, referees and the public can follow things more clearly. Now it becomes more and more difficult for there to be wrong decisions because everyone can see what’s going on.”

-For incidents of violence in the last period of time:

“Even if the government and the police do not do their job properly, things will not improve. In the meeting that took place, we discussed this with the president of UEFA and the prime minister of the country was also there. This is something positive.”

-For Panathinaikos and in 2012 when it took over PAE:

“Ever since I acted as a fan and not as a chairman I firmly believed that a club cannot be owned by one person, but by the fans of the team. We had done a survey in which we discovered that out of 11 million Greeks, 2 million are Panathenaic. Of these, 100,000 were the most die-hard and would be willing to give 500 euros for their team.

When I took over Panathinaikos it was a period when the country was facing very serious problems that led to the bankruptcy of the country. That was a difficult period and the truth is that no one then wanted to take over Panathinaikos. I had the option to let the team go bankrupt and start over. I decided not to proceed on this destructive path and therefore we had a hard fight ahead of us. I chose the hard way».

-For the 2017-18 season:

“At some point I thought about giving up and said I wanted to leave. I was hoping that someone would take over because I didn’t have the financial means to support the team, but no one did. So after 2017-18 I slowly started paying off the debt again, making our finances sound.”

-For the phase the team is in now:

“Now we are in a much better position and we have invested in the team hoping that at some point we will become financially self-sufficient. If we had qualified for the Champions League groups, we would have done it this year.”

-As for whether he has started to… relax:

“No, I can’t say I enjoy it, because it’s a duty for me. We have to achieve a lot even important things for me to start enjoying it. You need a long good period to start enjoying it.”