Tassos Hatzigiovanis spoke about OFI during an appearance on SKAI’s All In show.
“Before I decided to join, of course I spoke with the people on the team. I had seen what OFI had accomplished. I wanted to be part of this team, too. Just as other players did—like Bouhalakis, Androutsos, and Fountas, who came from big clubs—so did I… “We inspire each other; it’s really great to play with so many Greek players,” said the veteran star.
ΣΧΕΤΙΚΑ ΑΡΘΡΑ
As for Christos Kontis, he emphasized: “I wanted to say something about the coach—it’s very important for a coach to get the players to play for him. He sets the bar very high for us and reminds us of that before every game.”
Then, he became emotional again while speaking about the situation with Dimitris-Othon. The 29-year-old soccer player, who broke hearts with his recent speech at the PSAPP Awards—where he delivered a special message from the stage—referred to that specific incident. Just as with the shocking news about the “Children’s Playground” scandal, in which he intervened to ensure the donation funds went to Dimitris Othonas.
“It was something very difficult for me to deal with when I found out that these two people were behind it. I was talking to them, I was talking to ‘Children’s Playground,’ and I was shocked. They said the kindest things—about the children, about me. So it was a complete shock. I thought long and hard about what to say; they were words from the bottom of my heart, and they were just simple words—I didn’t say anything strange. We should all think this way,” he said at first.
He then looked back and talked about how he made the decision to take this commendable action. “When I saw the child’s post, I was on the Omonia charter flight, and I was truly very moved. The first thing I did was send it to my wife to read. I told her that it had touched me and that I was thinking of reaching out to ask how much we could donate to help this particular child. I’ve never donated that much before; I’ve always given what I could, but those were smaller amounts. She told me straight away that it was worth doing, so I went to the trouble of sending a message to find out what the child needed, in the hope that he might survive. They replied that it was the exact amount I ended up donating. I told my wife about it and said I wanted to do this. I let her know I would make the donation. I transferred the money,” he said, and continued:
“I also spoke with the child’s mother; she called me. She thanked me. I asked her if she had received the full amount, but the mother didn’t speak Greek very well. I never found out if she received the full amount. She probably didn’t receive the full amount. Honestly, that doesn’t bother me. It’s the least of my concerns. All I cared about was saving the child—that was the goal. I was always in touch with his mom. She’d tell me, “I bought him a toy with the money,” or “I bought him pizza.” I found out 15–20 days later that he had passed away. I was very saddened. It’s terrible when young children pass away like that. These are the difficult things in life.”
