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"I thought not to open the season, and then Shlomi Perry called" Israel today

2020-10-13T09:17:36.997Z


| Israeli basketballCompliments from the FIBA ​​Secretary General ("You saved the Israeli league") • The past economic crisis ("shouted 'thief'") • And the Balkan league that will start today with the participation of 12 Premier League teams ("I put money out of my pocket to play basketball here") • Shay Strix speaks Shay Strix. "I dealt with everything" Earlier this week, Camilla Novak, secretary general of FIBA


Compliments from the FIBA ​​Secretary General ("You saved the Israeli league") • The past economic crisis ("shouted 'thief'") • And the Balkan league that will start today with the participation of 12 Premier League teams ("I put money out of my pocket to play basketball here") • Shay Strix speaks

  • Shay Strix.

    "I dealt with everything"

Earlier this week, Camilla Novak, secretary general of FIBA ​​Europe, called Shai Strix, the "commissioner" of the Balkan league, and thanked him: "Believe me, there are not many crazy people like you who do for European basketball. You have saved the Israeli league."

To Luba, Strix's wife, Novak muttered with a smile: "I do not understand how you can stand him."

The Balkan League, the default of Israeli basketball in the fall of 2020, will launch today in a very special configuration.

One house of six teams that includes teams from the Balkans - two from Bulgaria, two from Montenegro and two from northern Macedonia, and another entire wing of 12 teams from the Israeli league in the Middle East.

And when it comes to geography, the 12 teams in the Premier League were divided into four regional houses, the winners of which will advance to the Final Four, at the end of which two teams will join the Balkan League.

complicated?

Not bad.

"Israeli groups would have suffered millions of euros in damage if they had been disabled," says Strix from his home in Sofia.

This is the 13th year that Strix, a former international referee, has been running the Balkan League.

In the early 2000s, things got financially complicated when his company, Krauss Laboratories, which imported cosmetics, incurred losses of NIS 2 million and went to a receiver.

In this context, Strix was forced to give up his home, and his late father Shabtai, who was previously chairman of the judges' union, was also forced to sell his home due to the guarantee he gave his son.

Strikes.

Persuaded the heads of the Bulgarian association to appoint Pini Gershon as coach of the Bulgarian national team

"I dealt with everything," says Strix, "they shouted at me 'thief' and 'bankrupt', but we reached an agreement and people accepted everything. In Israel it is easier to deal with murder than with a business collapse, so after all this corrective experience I preferred to open something abroad "To".

"The only Israeli who helped us"

The Balkan League was established by Strix after he hung his whistle at the end of the 2007 European Championships.

Indeed the league took hold and Strix's status gained momentum.

He persuaded the heads of the Bulgarian association to appoint Pini Gershon as coach of the Bulgarian national team, and even appointed himself the director of the team that qualified for the 2009 European Championships in Poland.

Strikes.

"Only one in Israel can do such a thing" 

The Balkan league managed to rise and even teams from Belgrade and Israel (Gilboa Galil and Hapoel Tel Aviv) joined at the beginning of the decade, but in recent years the league has lost height and quite a few teams, when the Serbian representatives abandoned it.

"Patrick Bauman, FIFA's secretary general at the time, together with Fiba Europe's people approached me and asked me how to get Kosovo into the league," Strix recalled. To the Olympic Committee and other sports frameworks. "

In Kosovo, Strix was described as "the only Israeli and Jew who helped us" and added: "Only one Israeli can do such a thing in the Balkans."

It cost Strix that the teams from Serbia did not want to play with those from Kosovo and left the league.

The claim is that you charge money groups for registration fees and seriousness fees to fund the heads of the organization.

Hapoel Tel Aviv complained at the time that you did not return the registration fee.

"There is a registration fee for the league (3,500 euros) that helps us fund the teams' travel in the Balkans, which is a non-money-rich region. I put my hand in my pocket for teams to play basketball and to this day I have put 300,000 euros out of my pocket to play basketball here."

Strix underwent extensive medical treatment in Israel about a year ago and is scheduled to arrive in December for tests and see his 90-year-old mother.

In the meantime, he managed to add an Israeli software company, Delsport, as an adopter of the league.

"I thought I would not open the season and then the director general of the administration, Shlomi Perry, called and we started moving the league," concludes Strix.

Source: israelhayom

All sports articles on 2020-10-13

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