Bartzokas: “I’m not so positive about changing a foreigner in view of Panathinaikos – Let’s forget last year’s Olympiakos”

Happy with the way it looks and the result Olympiakou against Maccabi Tel Aviv said George Bartzokas at the press conference after win of Piraeus in SEF for the 22nd matchday of the Euroleague.

The coach of the “red and white” was, of course, asked about Monday’s derby with Panathinaikos and he admitted that he is not particularly positive about the possibility of changing a foreign player, while he mentioned the difficulties that Piraeus are facing, with Nikolas Milutinov, but also to Luke Sikmas, whom he supports 100%.

In detail what Giorgos Bartzokas said:

“Thank you to the crowd and the players for this great night. It was obviously a game we had to win after the two defeats in Spain. I think we proved that we are a serious team, at least. Which is very important. You have to approach all matches the same way, with seriousness. Maccabi is a very strong and talented team. Our defense was solid, we didn’t allow them to score as much as they usually do. Especially in the second part. We had pace to score easily in attack.

Milutinov and the rest of the guys covered the absences, everyone knows what Mustafa Fal means to Olympiakos. We knew that Maccabi is first in rebounding, Nikola had 20/20, dominated and helped us win. I have to say how hard it is to be based in Belgrade, traveling back to Israel, they’ve had a great season so far.

Maccabi have the second best attack but we have the second best defence. We have attacking players, we have a consistently good defensive performance. We really believe that the way EuroLeague basketball is, you always have to be very consistent defensively. Tomorrow we will meet to look at the regulations, to see how long we can decide on a change. I am not so positive for a change, maybe a change, if necessary, can be made before the Cup. The match against Panathinaikos is always important, but it is not the most important of the year at the moment. Mr. Skindilias and the presidents will also meet, we will each give our opinion and we will decide.

We didn’t have the luxury tonight if the result will affect us positively or negatively in view of Panathinaikos. I don’t know what you expect from Olympiakos, we have created expectations because we went to two Final Four series. We turned the game against Barcelona twice and came close to equalizing. Do you really count playing with Colossus as a bad performance? We’ve played six games in two weeks. Many teams in Europe are losing. When we were worried at half-time against Kolossos because we were five points down. We cannot be troubled by these games.

The two matches in Spain, even against Baskonia in the first half, we were good. We played a very bad second half. There is pressure, let me not put the Colossus match into the equation, just like I don’t put it when we win by 40 points. They are races you have to manage. There’s just a lot of young guys in the rotation right now, there’s Brazdeikis, there’s Mitrou-Long, there’s Petrusev, there’s Milutinov and Shikma, even McKissick. They all have the pressure to show things. I’m not saying this to make excuses, clearly we should have got a win or two in Spain. Let’s forget last year’s Olympiakos, we are in the process of building a philosophy, those who come into the system face problems.

There is pressure on Sikmas, he was used to being the main spokesman of a good team for 6-7 years. He is an experienced player and I can assure you that in training he plays amazingly. Unfortunately he is not used to playing three minutes, five minutes and seven minutes and it is below his level, that is a given. He is a great professional and character, very positive. He always makes his training team better. Hopefully he will show what he is.”