Bartzokas: “With Fal, the finals would be different” – Irritation at a question about Sluka

THE George Bartzokas described the loss of Mustafa Fal as decisive for the finals of the championship after the defeat of Olympiakos from Panathinaikos in Game 5. The coach of the “red and whites” had a moment of tension with the journalist Yannis Kouvopoulos when he was asked if he ultimately believes that he mishandled the Sluka case last summer.

“I have a duty to congratulate Panathinaikos, they presented a very strong team. I’m proud of our team, not only for trying to overcome adversity all year, but now at the end the absence of Fal has thrown the effectiveness of our defense. The games took an aggressive form, where Panathinaikos is very strong. But such is life. In the 82 games we played this year we stayed together, if we had a better option at 11” or if Goss’ shot went in we probably would have won the championship. We will see from tomorrow how we can be better and I hope we will be luckier in the future. The finals series had tremendous quality based on the conditions in which the basketball was played. The games were of a very high quality, they were the best finals in Europe”he initially emphasized.

Regarding whether there was a player missing who can win a game on his own at Olympiakos, he said:Is it a provocative question? Any opinion you can say about basketball everyone stands for. We lost two Greek players, who chose not to stay in the team, one to Fener and the other to the NBA. Despite that we stayed as a team, won two titles, broke Barcelona’s home ground and went to the Final 4 and came here and came close to beating Panathinaikos, where not many have won. With the conditions that Olympiacos is facing here (s.s. at OAKA) and everyone can see them. If you want to reset… Nobody’s perfect. The last three MVPs went to the NBA, the pool is specific and based on what we had we did what we could. With Fal, the series would be different, based on what has happened in all the games with Panathinaikos. The rotation in the tall ones was very specific and we had problems. Milutinov, who had some good games in the series, was out twice with fractures. When the series comes to an end, it’s not in super shape».

Asked about which game cost him the title, he replied: “I would say the third. In the fourth quarter we played with a lot of pressure and missed 13 shots. If only that hadn’t happened, we would have won the championship”.

Finally, as to whether he could have handled the Slukas case differently than Yiannis Kouvopoulos, he got irritated and replied: “I believe that I am a very good coach myself and since you are the site of the truth, you will write things as they are. I am subjective, I am the coach of Olympiakos, you who are objective will find the truth. All the questions you ask have a purpose. Everyone writes a story. You can analyze things as you want on your site.”