Efy: “I promise to do the maximum to win every game.”

By Amy Samin

On Thursday evening 2 October 2008, Maccabi Electra Tel Aviv held its traditional season-opening press conference at the Tel Aviv Hilton.
On the panel of speakers were the heads of the club as well as the new head coach Efy Birenboim; and the General Manager of Electra, the team’s new sponsor, who revealed the new gift members of opposing Euroleague teams will receive at the start of every Maccabi home game: a handheld DVD player.
He also introduced the team’s new mascot, named “Electra,” who will cavort around the arena during games and get the crowd fired up.
Those attending the press conference were also shown the redesigned Maccabi website, including a spectacular clip featuring all the players of the 2008 – 2009 season.

The press conference was opened by Shimon Mizrahi, Chairman of the Board of the team, who said this, “We have built a new, top quality team.
We have a coaching staff that knows Israeli basketball very well, with Efy Birenboim and Roei Hagay, who worked together at Bnei Hasharon, and Avi Even, who has been in the system for a number of years.
We have new foreign players, and a group of players that the coaches wanted on the team.
This coming Saturday, scheduled to respect the tenets of our fans who keep the Sabbath, we will be hosting a farewell game in honor of Nikola Vujcic, who has joined Olympiacos.
I’m certain the arena will be packed with fans.
This will be a fitting farewell game for someone who accompanied us for 7 seasons, 6 with Maccabi and one with Vilerban.”

David Federman, one of Maccabi’s owners, added, “This is the highest budget Maccabi has ever had.
If we don’t reach the Top 16 in the Euroleague, it will be a big failure.
You can rise or fall with the first games in the Euroleague, and we saw in the preseason games that a team with a budget one-third the size of ours can come along and defeat a big team.
No amount of money is going to determine the outcome of a single game in such a short season.
That means that in order to get where we want to be, we have to fight for every game.
We had a difficult period at the end of last season, a large number of the people who have left the team were very important to us, but I am convinced that we have built a good team that is going to come together and enjoy playing together.”

The last to speak was head coach Efy Birenboim, who has set the standard for the coming season: to bring back the Israeli championship, to bring back the Israeli cup, and in the meantime, to reach the Top 16.
“It’s just the first course on the menu.
Like in a restaurant, we begin with an opening course and then continue.
We’re just getting started.
We learned about the team in the preseason games, and we still have a lot of work to do.
We need to work on things that every team works on at the beginning of the season.”

“There’s a new sponsor for the team,” Efy continued, “the team manager is gone, and I’ve come in on a new era for Maccabi Tel Aviv.
I’m very proud they chose me to lead the team, from a professional point of view.
There have been player changes and changes in the professional team.
Maccabi wants to bring back the championship and the cup, and like David said, I want to say that we want to make the Top 16 first of all, and then we’ll see what comes next.
I’m very pleased with the progress being made in practices.
I was concerned about participating in two preseason tournaments abroad, because we practiced a lot less than we needed to during that time.
Now we’re changing our style, because there are new players and a new team.
We’re finding a system that is exciting, dynamic and cooperative that will bring victories.
We’re working very hard towards that, and I promise that we will do the maximum to win every game.”

“We’ve just played against teams where 13 or 14 of the players could play on any team in Europe.
I am aware that we have a team of 12 top quality players.
We are aware of that, and we’ve discussed putting more players into the games than normally play.
These are excellent players, and in addition there is the injury factor.
There are players who will be in the rotation but won’t play, but during games in the Israeli league they will go in and play.”

About the release of Marcus Fizer, Efy said, “You want me to say that in his place I will be bringing Hakim Olajuwon’s cousin, but there are players here who haven’t yet worn the jersey.
There’s no such thing as a perfect team.
The smart thing about a good team is that it can make up for its deficiencies.
For that you need patience and hard work.
We’re aware of the weaknesses that have come to light.
Every team has its minuses, and the role of the players is to make up for those in order to bring victories.”

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