Ioannis Kalampokis, President of the Greek Professional Basketball Players Union, spoke about its actions in relation to the happenings in European basketball.
By Eurohoops team / info@eurohoops.net
Kalampokis highlights that the players should be the main concern for basketball organizations: “Ι could say that this evolution of things is something positive, because everyone will realize the importance of players. If there weren’t any players then none of this would exist. Now everyone has turned their attention to players’ health. That’s what they are thinking about. We (Union of Professional Basketball Players) have made announcements. We have been searching for a way to express our opinion for quite some time. We are still processing the whole thing, this is why we haven’t gone further. When the Spanish Union released an announcement, we supported them. Few days ago we released another announcement where we emphasize that we will be even more active to our directions.”‘
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“There is a European Institution (GIBA) that is inactive”, Kalampokis says. “But we are taking the initiative to contact these institutions and the unions from other countries. It’s different to have 4-5 countries speaking out than the union of Greece, or the union of Spain, expressing an opinion separately. The reasons we are doing this are obvious. The whole thing that is going on in European basketball offers competition and good contracts. I don’t know if the tensions of “fleeing” to China or other countries plays a part. The biggest ideal for a player is to represent your country. Finding a bigger contract shouldn’t be your bigger motivation. You must think about it, but not against your national team.”
