Urgent need for cash unites Greek basketball’s adversaries

Federation, clubs set aside differences as they seek lucrative TV rights contract

Greek basketball adversaries declared that they have bridged various differences and emerged united from a top-level meeting of basketball and government officials yesterday, no doubt believing that a unified approach in their current search for a broadcasting rights deal would serve them better.

Despite the country’s commanding presence in European club-level basketball — Panathinaikos was crowned European Champion for the third time last season — Greek clubs have been plagued by financial woes in recent seasons, mostly because of declining television ratings and dismal attendance figures. Currently without a broadcasting deal, the national basketball league is now searching to sell its product to television. A deal is deemed as crucial for the financial standing of the league’s 14 clubs. State-run television, ET, is being touted as the likeliest prospect.

ESAKE, the national basketball league’s association of professional basketball clubs, has rejected a sports draft bill aimed at safeguarding the financial stability of clubs, and subsequently fought a bitter battle against EOK, Greece’s basketball federation, which has sided with the government. The dispute has threatened to stall competition in the new season.

But, yesterday, Giorgos Vassilakopoulos, the head of EOK, and a team of ESAKE representatives, emerged from their meeting with Deputy Culture Minister Yiannis Kourakis, the state’s top sporting official, in unison.

“We’re heading in a very good direction and have entered the road heading towards solutions,” Vassilakopoulos said.

During the meeting, the deputy culture minister said that demands for revisions to the draft sports bill — which team administrators had tabled during a recent meeting with Culture Minister Evangelos Venizelos — will be met. ESAKE reacted to a clause that would demand letters of credit from all 14 clubs worth the full amounts of their respective annual budgets as a safeguard of their financial stability. Venizelos promised to reduce the amount to 10 percent.

Demands that obliging teams to pay out 10 percent of their television rights to the Greek police were rejected.

Also, on foreign signings, it was agreed to implement a four-player limit per team roster for basketball players hailing from the 15-member European Union, and a two-player limit on players coming from the EU’s 10 candidate states.

Commenting on the national basketball league’s prospects of landing a broadcasting rights deal for the new season, the local basketball federation’s head, Vassilakopoulos, claimed that besides state-run ET, interest was also being shown by other stations, without elaborating further. Whether this interest is real, or an artificial bid-boosting attempt, remains unknown.

One notable absence from yesterday’s meeting was ESAKE’s president, Manolis Papakaliatis. His failure to attend came as further proof of a rumored power battle being prepared by subordinates who intend to overthrow Papakaliatis.