The officials of the Hellenic Basketball Federation were recently claiming that they were expecting to be able to announce the replacement of Fotis Katsikaris until the end of February and it seems that they have managed to do so with the most successful Greek head coach of last seasons.
The only thing remaining before the official announcement of hiring right now is the acceptance of Dimitris Itoudis club, CSKA Moscow, since there is a term at his current contract allowing the 2015-16 Euroleague winners and the Russian Basketball Federation as well to "block" the deal with Greece National Team.
So, there will be a meeting between the two sides on Monday, and if CSKA Moscow finally agree, it seems almost certain that the Russian Basketball Federation will do the same and the 46-year-old former assistant coach of Panathinaikos BC will become the new head coach of his motherland's national squad.
President and General Secretary of the HBF, Giorgos Vasilakopoulos and Takis Tsagronis correspondingly, had a meeting with Dimitris Itoudis before CSKA Moscow's recent Euroleague clash against KK Crvena zvezda in Russia and made clear that they consider him to be the ideal candidate for this position.
The Greek head coach, who was certainly more than willing to help his motherland and our National Team, asked them to allow him work without rush or time pressure, in order to create once again a very strong side, able to compete for medals in the important competitions, as it did between 2005 and 2009.
The officials of the Hellenic Basketball Federation, who should be praised for this important move in a very difficult time for Greek basketball, after the negative campaigns of last summers, agreed to do so and in the next 72 hours we will learn if Dimitris Itoudis, the most successful Greek sports trainer in recent years, will finally become the new head coach of our National Team.
