Friday, April 15, 2011

Olympiakos looking for a center

Or how now to waste player changes.


In Olympiakos they wasted their 2 player changes for the season swapping players from their existing roster around and now that their most important big man is injured, they seem to be running out of options. The cases of players that fit the bill are numbered. And to make matters even worse, the injury of Radoslav Nesterovic(2.13-C) will keep him out of the Greek Cup final as well.

Mavroeidis(2.09-C) is bound by contract with Bilbao for 2 more seasons and it's unlikely they'll release him for nor love or money but hey, stranger things have happened. The same goes for Alexei Savrasenko(2.13-C) who has played for Olympiakos in the past and he is the owner of a Greek passport. However.. Khimki might not be so willing to release him and it's uncertain what is the status of his Greek passport. To make things clear Nesterovic also has a Greek passport but not all of his "affairs" with the Greek state are in order so he had to be declared as a Slovenian player instead.

Lazaros Papadopoulos(2.13-C) has played for Ivkovic in the past with success but he can't play again in Greece as he has already played for Paok. Kostas Koufos(2.13-C) is still in the NBA play-offs with the Denver Nuggets and after the Printezis debacle, it's improbable that Malaga will release him. Printezis is not a center but he could help in the PF position.

All this wouldn't have happened if the technical staff of Olympiakos hadn't thrown away 2 foreign player changes  in the 2nd round of the Greek league and now they can't even bring Matt Nielsen back. There is also one more case that hadn't been mentioned of Jake Tsakalidis(2.18-C) but it seems that he's dropped off the face of the earth and has probably quit basketball altogether. So it seems now that Andreas Glyniadakis(2.15-C) will be re-activated and he doesn't have much time to adapt within the team and help out Bouroussis who will be the starting center of Olympiakos.

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1 comments:

Emili Paz said...

This is a tough situation for coach Ivkovic, especially since they need this final win in order to redeem their failed campaign for the Final Four this year. There will, for sure, be a lot of negotiations that will go on with the management and other teams with their prospect players but the injury of Rasho Nesterovic will create a huge impact because of his leadership and presence on the court.