Houchoulis: “Panerythraikos will be ready for something more”

THE Dimitris Houchoulis will soon be 25 years old Pan-Erythraeanjust in time for half a century for our club, following the renewal of the partnership between the two sides, with our men’s team manager and coach speaking for the first time since the renewal on EOK Web Radio about this lifelong relationship, which every day it gets stronger, taking stock of the past season.

In detail, what he said:

For his name being associated with Paneurthraikos: “Behind Paneurthraikos there is a long history that “touches” 50 years. I may be present at 25, but since there are no parthenogenesis, there were people who created Paneurthraikos, “ran” it, brought it to the point where I took it over, along with other people who were very important for the team’s progress. This combination and the respect that has existed throughout the years between coach and management have made Paneurthraikos strong. All this success is due to all the people.”

On whether when he first joined the team he thought he would stay so many years in a row: “If I say I imagined it would be a lie. Year after year, it was a new motivation for me. Every year Paneurthraikos does different things, winning categories, falling into categories but staying “alive” and finding the strength to come back, creating in recent years a very strong development program, reaching the final of the Elite League. As the current president of the team, Mr. Tsikopoulos, has said, the year we were 40 minutes away from the Basket League, realistically the team must be on the high “floors” and create, give space and time to new players. We are proud to have achieved this, we have shown with over 6-7 children in the last five years that they found a place in A1. The team wants to have this “identity” and if something more comes along, we are here to serve it.”

On what has changed in him compared to his first day in the team: “Compared to the first day I came to Paneurthraikos, where before I had seven years at Doukas, I have definitely become more experienced, I can better manage situations, the good and bad moments, become better. Twenty hours a day, my thoughts and my energy are on the Paneuthraikos basketball department. In many tracks, not just the men’s team. Through this whole process, I think I have become better too.”

For the fact that on Saturday he had a match with the men’s division and on Sunday he had the U8, U10 and U11 divisions: “When this process started, because I was used to it, in the first days it was not so easy for me. It didn’t take long to get into this routine, which did me a lot of good. This whole process after the tension, the pressure, the joy and the sadness, the fatigue, worked for me as a psychoactive drug. When the next day I saw these children, at these ages and with the passage of time they were developing, I was filled with joy and I felt important, that I was doing something. All this made me rest faster than the men’s and from Monday I enter with a clear mind, whether we had won or lost, for the next men’s match”.

For the past season: “Every day, every minute you learn and if through this you can and understand it, that’s the only way you can come out better. We made a very new team, with 13 new faces. Some things didn’t fit in the beginning, we made some changes at the end of the 1st round and the team worked better. In the 2nd round, the team won the championship and if we had won the last game against Ermis Schimatariou, we would have entered the play-offs. These guys won their own championship this year. At the beginning we did something wrong, first of all me who plans the team, but we found the strength to correct it, and while we found ourselves with one foot on the “cliff”, we managed to press hard and in the last match to prevail against Ayandas Evosmos and stay fair in the Elite League for the 10th year in a row”.