Panathinaikos, one of the most glorious clubs in the history of European basketball, has been in constant decline for over a decade.
The Greek team, who have won 6 European titles, lifted the last trophy somewhere in 2011, and since then have seen hated rivals Olympiakos become a permanent member of the top Euroleague and also take away the local hegemony from them.
Last summer, the rich and unstable owner Dimitris Yanakopoulos decided to stop the deterioration and according to reports in Greece prepared a three-year plan according to which an astronomical sum of 100 million euros will be invested in the group.
The owner even publicly confirmed that the team's budget this season is 35 million euros.
For comparison, Maccabi Tel Aviv's budget is about 23 million euros.
In Pau they decided to go all out for a return to the fight for the European title and brought in the senior Turkish coach Ergin Atman, who in the last two years won the Euroleague championship twice in a row with Anadolu Efes.
Atman's salary: over a million euros per season in the next two years.
In the high-quality and expensive squad are two of the top ten earners in the Euroleague: Kostas Sloukas who crossed the road from Olympiakos and will earn 10 million euros in the next three seasons (this season he receives about 2.7 million euros), and the Spanish Juancho Hernangomez who came from the NBA and earns about 2.5 million euros for the season
Coach Argin Atman.
In the meantime, justifies the high salary, photo: IPA
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In the meantime, it seems that the project is in the right direction and the Greek team is ranked fourth with a record of 14 wins and 8 losses, with Maccabi Tel Aviv in ninth place with 12 wins and 10 losses.
Tonight (Thursday, 21:05) we will get another chance to take a look at the expensive and ambitious project.
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