Hapoel Tel Aviv opens up their first ever Euroleague campaign on Tuesday night (7pm Israel Time) when they welcome Barcelona to Sofia for their home away from home opener on Gameday One.

As the Reds finished off their preparations, veteran Israeli forward Tomer Ginat and Head Coach Dimitrios Itoudis spoke about the tough matchup against Barcelona as well as their thoughts about finally opening up their continental campaign.

“We’re very excited,” Ginat began. “We have been waiting for this for a long time and we prepared the best that we could. We understand that we have a very big challenge and Barcelona is a great team but we are ready for the challenge and we are coming to win the game.

Hapoel will not be playing in Israel for the time being as the war against Hamas continues, but unfortunately this is something that Ginat and the Reds are used to, “It’s not easy and it’s already the third season that we have to play our home games in a different country, so it is what it is. We all hope that the war is going to be over and all of the hostages will come back home as soon as possible but unfortunately we are used to it so we know how it feels and with these circumstances we still have to come here tomorrow and get a win.”

The preseason wasn’t ideal as many players were with their national teams, “Obviously, as everybody knows, our pre-season wasn’t perfect because we had a lot of players in the national teams so we had to face a lot of challenges, but we know the team, we trust ourselves, we know each other and we are ready for the challenge.”

The head coach gave his thoughts on getting the season underway, “We are very excited to play in Sofia and we are very excited to represent Hapoel Tel Aviv, the fan base and Israeli basketball in the EuroLeague. We are looking forward to that and we are preparing in the best possible way. The toughest part is that we don’t have our fans that they know how to create the atmosphere but we believe that given the time and opportunities that will also come. On the other hand, we need to be realistic as we have been forced to play elsewhere. I don’t think we need to open that topic because all Israeli teams are forced to play away from their native homes. But at the same time we are happy that we are hosted by Sofia and Bulgaria in general.“

Itoudis also referenced as to how the club built the team in a way that they could compete both in Europe and domestically, “It’s the circumstances that give you that. We are not in the same situation with other teams when they build the team. During the summer, we took some decisions based on the circumstances and the limitations we have had and the restrictions we have had from Euroleague. We wanted to have two very competitive teams on both, on local league, Israeli league, Super Cup.

“We are at the final of the Super Cup, so managed to reach that and we are in on one of the goals we have this year and we wanted to have a long roster in order to try to predict things like the things that happen. For instance, one morning you wake up and Yam Madar goes for the surgery of appendix. Who could predict that thing? So you need a depth roster in order to operate. On the other hand, we have to practice more and find the right chemistry.”

As for the importance of getting off on the right foot, Itoudis understands that there’s a real reason as to why he wants to ensure that Hapoel Tel Aviv plays well and competitively, “We go every game at due time and this game is important for many reasons. We want to show to the Euroleague, to us, that we belong here. For sure, we play against a great team and Barcelona has tons of experience and in each position has two players that can really bring the results. So it will be a good fight for us. It was a pity that we couldn’t actually compete in the pre-season due to the different facts. One of the facts is that we’ve been called to go and play Super Cup games earlier, so we could not compete in some tournaments with some other rivals to see where we are at.”

Itoudis is aware that there is pressure to make sure that Hapoel finishes high enough in the standings to be able to continue in the Euroleague after this season as they don’t have a guaranteed contract but at the same time he doesn’t want to give a prediction as to where he thinks his team will finish.

“I’m not going to say where is going to be the position, first we need to become a team. Obviously, we have expectations from ourselves because the president and everybody who owns the team, Mr. Yanai, Mr. Raanan and Mr. Malka, they put high standards and we want to have high standards. But let’s go one step at a time, let’s go first to play that game and try to win against Barcelona and we’ll see after that. It will not be interesting if I tell you what position we’re going to end up in.”