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Great article about Greek hockey


Ziaka

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NHL.com has a great article about the problems facing Greek ice hockey:

Across The Pond

Team Greece winning uphill battle for survival

By Bill Meltzer

NHL.com Correspondent

Sept. 28, 2006

Most hockey players take their access to an ice rink for granted. The rink becomes their home away from home; so much a part of daily life that they don't even think about their entries and exits. It's only after someone's playing days are over -- or the real world intercedes -- that the player begins to long for the rink. Suddenly the player recalls the rink as an inner sanctum, the one place where the world makes sense.

In that regard, the members of Greece's national hockey team and the rest of its small, close-knit hockey community were just like players the world over. Once upon a time, they never thought their toughest battle would be to simply have a place to play. But circumstances beyond their control left them without a single viable rink in their country and no funding for the national hockey program.

That's when a determined group of Greek hockey players, driven only by their love of the game and desire to play for their country and for one another, banded together. They fought both for the survival of their team and of hockey in their homeland.

Since 2003, Greece has been just one of one three European countries without a rink in the country, along with Albania and Malta. But the players of Team Greece have gone to extraordinary lengths to stay together on and off the ice. All the while, they've lobbied anyone who'll listen for a place to practice and play in their country.

"We're hockey players. We want to keep the sport alive," says Team Greece captain Dimitris Kalyvas. "We live in a country that hosted the 2004 Olympics. I just can't and won't accept the idea we can't have an ice rink. For the past three years I've done everything I can to make the rink a reality. I won't stop until we succeed. The obstacles on the road only make the goal even bigger. We deserve a rink and I promise that one day all Greeks will be able to skate on a rink in Greek soil."

Read the full article here:

Team Greece winning uphill battle for survival

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i am a greek in australia. i never even knew greece had an ice hockey team. but now i would love to see how they are going with their competitions. anyone know if they have a homepage?

i hope these battlers dream does come true. and have a rink called the Acropolis.

lol

p.s thanks to czech republic for been friendly

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Great article.... The one thing us Greeks have no matter where we are..its passion.

there are plenty of Greeks in Canada & the USA that are good in hockey & can help the Greek hockey program evolve..

I never thought i would say it...Greek hockey program...

GHL.... PAO, OLY, AEK should start the Greek hockey league :D

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