The Spanish Speaking Revolution at Asteras

The Spanish Speaking Revolution at Asteras

By Alexander Koutakos

Asteras' roster has gotten to a point where Spanish speaking players make up 20 of the 35 players on the roster in accordance with Transfermarkt. 

Many of these players are crucial for Asteras, however I believe the club has gone overboard with the so-called "Spanish Speaking Revolution". 

There are many benefits of having the players from the Spanish speaking countries, yet if we are to progress as a club, I think we need to look in rather than look out. Asteras’ academy is one of the strongest in all of Greece and in the past decade we have produced many talented players including: Kourbelis, Bakasetas, Douvikas, Kyriakopoulos, Tzimas and many others. All of these players have been sold and many of them have been sold too early due to foreign arrivals or not being able to get playing time. 

For example, Douvikas and Tzimas both left in-part due to the fact that Barrales played as the sole striker for the past few years and therefore, they did not get playing time. Tzimas and Douvikas left at very young ages and I think that they could have been sold for a lot more if the club had given them adequate playing time. 

I like Barrales as a player and by no means do I want the club to get rid of him, but I would have loved to see one of Douvikas and Tzimas to play up-top with Barrales in a two-striker formation such as the 4-4-2. 

The Spanish-speaking revolution has also caused the club to become somewhat disjointed and many of the young Greeks have been discouraged and left out of the team. For this, I am mainly referring to the young CB’s of Antzoulas and Christopoulos. Antzoulas(21) has played abroad in Italy already in the primavera with Fiorentina and as a professional with Concenza(in Serie B) and Christopoulos currently plays for Greece’s u-21 team and he also rotates between Asteras’s u-21 team and the main team. 

Despite their promising talent it is looking like the club will primarily utilize Suarez, Castano and the new signing of Atienza as the main options at the CB position. This again, makes Antzoulas and Chritsopoulos feel like they need a loan move. The truth is that Antzoulas and Christopoulous have the most potential of the 5 and can easily become top players in the future. 

The club already lost Kalogeropoulos, who went to Olympiacos for next to nothing. He had and still has a ton of potential and he really impressed Olympiacos fans and he drew comparisons to Panagiotis Retsos. 

For Asteras’s board, letting him go was a huge mistake that will potentially cost Asteras millions in the future. Asteras should learn from this and actually utilize what they have at their disposal(Antzoulas and Christopoulos). If they don’t learn, they can expect to see more young and talented players leave and thus, they would have to keep on buying players and paying higher wages on foreign players. Which is something that could cause a team like Asteras some financial insecurities.

At the end of the day, a team like Asteras should only buy foreign players if they can raise the ceiling at the club. Signings like Barrales, Munafo and Fernandez I am okay with. However, signings like Ruben Garcia, Atienza and other washed up second division players I am not okay with. I would rather young-Greek talent get the opportunity they deserve. 

This revolution is expanding rapidly (now 60% of the team is Spanish-speaking) and I am now frightened that the club will have to face some economic and social problems if the revolution continues. 

Hopefully, the club will replace the outgoings of Kotsiras and Tzimas with some Greek talent. It would be a shame if we started next season with only 1 Greek in the starting XI (Tsiftis/Papadopoulos in goal). 

Hellas Football

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