The Olympiakos delegation landed in Athens at noon on Tuesday (23/4), with several fans of the team heading to the airport to welcome the European champions.
At 15.00 in the afternoon, the Olympiakos team landed at “Eleftherios Venizelos”, after the historic conquest of the Youth League by K19.
About 100 friends of Piraeus were at the airport to celebrate the “golden babies” of Sotiris Sylaidopoulos who brought Greece the first – at club level – European football title.
“Here they are, here they are, the champions”, the red and white fans chanted rhythmically, with the young footballers getting off the coach and deifying themselves.
The coach of Olympiacos, Sotiris Sylaidopoulos, led the Piraeus to the top of Europe and in his first statements upon the team’s arrival he emphasized that Olympiacos is rightly the champion of Europe, while emphasizing that this success improved the image of Greek football.
What he said in detail:
“If we consider that we slept like mortals and woke up European champions, I think we are good. It is a great achievement, historic. We are happy to have represented the club well. It is something unique for us that this club has 100 years of history and we have put a small stone. The future is ahead of us. It is also very important that we also represented Greek football, we helped the status of Greek football to grow abroad, whether it concerns the Greek talents, the clubs, or the Greek coaches.
About when he believed that Olympiacos would win the trophy: It was a process. Through each match we grew, each game filled us with faith, with confidence in what we have achieved. It was a journey that apart from individual improvement, we also saw the team grow. If we look at the big picture at the end of the day, we are rightfully European champions.
We are really the only team that was unbeaten, maybe us and Real, we had the best defense of the tournament and the 2nd best attack. It is not something common for Greek teams, especially in European competitions. Through this process we grew as a club, as footballers and it helped us to look at each opponent equally and equally.
Because the team played attacking football in the final: “We have a very specific plan for what we want to do in a match. The kids kept it 100%. At half time what we said was that we had a better performance in the 1st half than the opposition, we had the chances to score goals. We asked to continue, to stay true to the plan. We knew that there are 45 minutes and there is no going back and we wanted to bring the Cup to Greece”.
For team dynamics: “We should not underestimate ourselves. There is talent in Greece, whether it concerns the footballers or the way the Academies work. At least as far as Olympiakos is concerned, I am sure of the work that has been done over the years. It is an evolving process and the best is yet to come. We must remain loyal to the Greeks, to Greek football, to the Greek coaches. And why not; You see, we are not lagging behind other European teams”.
