Makedonas

Wozniacki has only played Billie Jean King Cup once since 2011, but I'm sure they'll bend the rules for her and use her retirement/pregnancy as an excuse for not playing during this Olympic period (unless she ends up playing in April). Not that she has a chance of doing anything, especially on clay courts, and I don't know if she'll be able to qualify in mixed doubles with Rune (which she said was one of the reasons why she came back) considering how low her ranking is and time is really running out for her to move up. She'll probably have to be top 30 or so in the next few months and she's currently nowhere near there and hasn't been taking the tour schedule seriously enough in my opinion.

I guess mathematically there is still a chance for Georgiadou to overtake Gkountoura for Greece's quota spot in the women's sabre. However, Gkountoura can clinch her spot in Paris this weekend...

You'd probably be fine, basically everyone under age 50 speaks English to some degree, and over 50 I'd say it's hit or miss. Especially in Athens, most people are more "educated" than in for example some remote/rural villages. Anyways nowadays Greek has adopted so many English words that you probably speak more "Greek" than you think

Next time you should take the metro! It's clean, modern and efficient and easy to use and cheaper than taxis. Generally very safe but of course just be careful, as you would be in any other big city using public transport. Also although the Plaka/Monastiraki areas are quite touristy, a lot of local Greeks also hang out there and go to the restaurants and rooftop bars, so it's probably more authentic than you think, but I get what you mean. I've never been to Olympia and I used to want to go, but to be honest most people say it's not that impressive . If you go to Peloponnese (area where Olympia/Patras are), it's better to go to Nafplio (our former capital city) and the Mani Peninsula as well as the western Messinia area (Voidokilia Beach, Polylimnio Waterfalls). Yeah I get what you mean about football and basketball, though it depends on which teams are playing. Games with other European teams are usually more calm (with some exceptions especially if the opponents are from the Balkans). I would avoid a derby at all costs...

Looks like yet another sailing event where we'll narrowly miss the quota and have to try again at the last chance regatta

I'm glad you enjoyed it! I've never been to the National Archaeological Museum. I thought about going last year when I was in Athens but I'm pretty sure it is near a bad area of the city, I'll probably go again later this year so maybe I'll check it out. Yes, Greeks are not the most careful drivers especially in cities It's too bad if you didn't go to any sporting events while you were there, but next time definitely check out some islands or mainland - northern Greece (Thessaloniki, Halkidiki, Mount Olympus, Meteora...) Did you have gemista with just rice or with rice and meat? My grandmother made the best one, with rice and meat, but I've found that the vegetarian version is more common in taverns, at least from my experience!

Big scandal now because they didn't have to do the last race, they already had enough races for the results to be valid and our federation either didn't know or deliberately chose to do another race and then we lost the quota place after Papadakos got 37th and the Slovenian guy 8th to move ahead of Papadakos by 4 points... The women had less races than the men for example, and many people complained to our federation that it should've been stopped. Aimilios Papathanasiou, who represented us 5 times at the Olympics, was the commentator on the live stream and even he was saying it that there shouldn't be another race... Just stupidity from our sailing federation. Hopefully Papadakos can qualify at the last chance regatta. He did well here and at the World Championships so he is definitely one of the favourites for a quota...

No one is coming to Greece? I'm happy to give recommendations

I don't think so. They didn't win a medal at the World Championships last year, and this year they won gold but had a few narrow wins.

+1 M Triple Jump: Dimitrios Tsiamis I saw a Greek source claim he will be the oldest competitor ever at the World Indoor Championships. He is 42 years old since January. Can anyone confirm this?

Papadakos was comfortably in position until he totally blew it in the last race Still 0 Greek sailors qualified for the Olympics, if it remains that way it'll be the first time since 1936 where we are not competing in sailing at the Olympics. Reminder that we had 8 sailors in Tokyo so it's not like we had a tiny team then...

https://www.facebook.com/eurilca/posts/pfbid0dkKx7EGfDCS1zywUrS2cGS1SfxEM16pKzYKoDRDZfwzHkwc7DRWqH8zMAHNZ5RLsl This is not looking good. Of course the one time we host an Olympic qualification event, something has to go terribly wrong. Of course we can't control the weather but still, just our luck Does anyone know how the Olympic quotas be reallocated if we can't complete this regatta on time?

M 60m: Ioannis Nyfantopoulos 60m H: Konstantinos Douvalidis Pole Vault: Emmanouil Karalis Long Jump: Miltiadis Tentoglou W 60m: Polyniki Emmanouilidou 60m H: Elisavet Pesiridou Pole Vault: Katerina Stefanidi High Jump: Tatiana Gusin

I thought he was born on Mount Olympus? He said today he hopes to get Greek citizenship so he can compete in Paris. I'm still confused as to how he can compete for Greece in the European Championships without citizenship? I know in athletics we had some athletes who couldn't compete for the "national team" until getting citizenship, but in meets around the world they were listed as "GRE" athletes for a while.

Gold for Kurugliev, can't say I'm really able to celebrate this

2024 European Wrestling Championships: GOLD Dauren Kurugliev (Men's Freestyle 86 kg) BRONZE Maria Prevolaraki (Women's Freestyle 53 kg)

Και τώρα πήρε χάλκινο μετάλλιο στο Παγκόσμιο Πρωτάθλημα στα 100 ύπτιο!

NR for our girls but it was still not enough Would've been so nice to see Drasidou make it, from Drama as a swimmer to the Olympics, and she was so close but it's not happening

Gkolomeev 8th in the final, a bit disappointing to be honest. Ntountounaki ended up getting in as an alternate and got 7th instead of her usual 9th place for a change Also 9th for Makrygiannis in the men's 50 backstroke with a big PB Last day tomorrow with three events for us, all with Olympic qualification on the line - men's 400 medley (Papastamos) and the two medley relays. The most important is the women's medley relay because that would give Drasidou and Kontogeorgou spots at the Olympics. The men's medley team won't produce any new Olympians, and Papastamos will have other chances to get OQT as he did for Tokyo as well.

2024 Women's Water Polo World Championship: Semifinals: 11- 13 Third place game: 9 - 10 2024 Men's Water Polo World Championship: 5-8 Playoff: 14 - 13 5-6 Playoff: 15 - 11

Another comfortable win for us against Serbia in the 5th place game. We used to always lose to them, now we beat them at three tournaments in a row. Serbia have not won any medal since Tokyo where they beat us in the final to win gold...

Also we have Kurugliev in the 86kg final. He still doesn't have Greek citizenship though, so it's not certain if he'll be able to compete in Paris (assuming he qualifies). Honestly I don't have much interest in him, him competing for Greece just seems fake, I don't understand how people from other countries regularly celebrate these types of medals. For me it just isn't the same feeling as when "one of our own" wins something. And btw I'm fine with people like Antetokounmpo, Gkolomeev, Tzengko who all lived in Greece either from birth or shortly after, it's just Kurugliev and Walkup in basketball who came recently, were never part of the Greek system, have no Greek ancestry, don't speak the language...

Kougioumtsidis lost the bronze medal match He won gold in 2022 as a 20 yo, silver in 2023 as a 21 yo, now no medal as a 22 yo. I think his results are a bit misleading, he is still on a good path, I think he won gold too early and that maybe messed up the expectations for him.

Yeah, in situations like this it is probably better to be in the stronger group so you can avoid a tougher quarterfinal (assuming you make it out of the group).

I am well aware of the great history and tradition that Hungary has in this sport, which is why I am surprised that they see a need to naturalise foreign players! I've said the same thing about other countries in other sports (Spain in basketball with Lorenzo Brown for example), so at least I am consistent in my views. I am even annoyed when my own country does it (very rare but there are a few examples, which I won't bore you to explain the circumstances of, and no I'm not talking about the weightlifters from the Greek minority of Albania as that is a different topic). Also I was supporting Hungary at the Tokyo Olympics since Greece didn't qualify, and I wanted Hungary to finally win an Olympic medal. I was very glad when they did! The game we had against your girls here was very close which is why I said without those three non-Hungarian players, we would've won. In a game so close, the small differences are important, and I think without those players, we would've won. I still think we could've won anyways and I'm not saying it's an excuse for us losing, or the only reason why we lost, but it definitely plays a role And I'm happy for Canada because I think it is better for the sport. We saw how South Africa played in Tokyo and it was not pretty. They didn't "earn" any quota, they just got lucky that there are no other teams in Africa. It's not like Canada stole the quota from them, South Africa refused it.