SHUTTLECOCK

Jordan Stavridis President of GSF | 2716 total views since Mar 31, 05|

An Interview of the President of the Greek Shuttlecock Federation, Mr. Jordan Stavridis. The man who brought Shuttlecock Sport to Greece speaks to Mike Delaporta of the www.featherball.gr

Rep.: Good afternoon Mr. Stavridis, firstly, I would like to thank you for your time, despite your busy schedule, for this interview.

Pres.: Good afternoon, the pleasure is mine.

Rep.: From what I know you’ve been dealing with a new sport in Greece, known as shuttlecock, tell us a few things about it?

Pres.: I would prefer if we called this sport “Podopterisi”, which is a completely Greek concept, which we can understand better. Podopterisi therefore, is a Chinese sport with more than 1.500 years of history, which is not played only in China, but in many other Asian countries, as well.

Rep.: How you came you find out about Podopterisi?

Pres.: During one of my business trips to China, I saw a group of elderly men, playing with a small ball that looked like the one used in the Badminton. When I got near to them, for the first time I saw a peculiar ball with feathers, which the Chinese call "Chien Tsu". Not to mention, how easily I got “stuck” to the game. I joined the group of those elderly men, played with them till nightfall, being the last to leave. For as long as I was in China, we met daily, (me and that admirable group of elderly men), and played Chinese football. I believe that it is unnecessary to say, that I adored this game.

Rep.: You mentioned a group of elderly, what do you mean by “elderly”?

Pres.: They were all retired men, which mean that they should have been at least 65 years old.

Rep.: That’s truly remarkable, playing in such an age.

Pres.: The Chinese people do not ever consider the game as a game. The particular group simply selected the Chinese football as a mean of daily gymnastics. This is also one from the major reasons that Podopterisi is a unique sport.

Rep.: What do you mean by the characterization of “unique sport”?

Pres.: Podopterisi is a sport, which includes football, volleyball and badminton; therefore it becomes a spectacular, competitive and easy to understand sport. The major, however, advantage of Podopterisi, is that the game doesn't have any restrictions neither in age, in height, in weight, nor in sex. For those exact reasons, the ones that have played the game consider Podopterisi a unique sport.

Rep.: How much known or unknown is this sport to the whole world? What is the situation here in Greece?

Pres.: A demonstration of the game was presented, for first time in Europe at the Olympic Games of Munich in 1936; it was the very first time that Europe got in touch with the sport. The most important, however, experience with Podopterisi, had the athletes of the national teams that took part in the Olympic Games of Seoul. During the intervals between the games, the athletes saw small groups of Koreans, Chinese and Vietnamese playing shuttlecock. As you can understand in a lot of Asian countries shuttlecock is well known and of course widespread. In Greece, for first time we played Chinese football was back in 1986 with a group of friends and collaborators.

The last two years, Podopterisi has acquired a lot of fans. The G.S.F. (Greek Shuttlecock Federation) was founded with enough associations, members and a lot of significant athletes, which represent Greece in European and in International events.

Rep.: You mentioned International and European events, under who’s support and which institute is responsible for such organizations?

Pres.: Mainly, the federation of each country depends on the ISF (International Shuttlecock Federation) with its office in Beijing, which is in charge for each international event that is organized. On the other hand, for the European events, the ESF (European Shuttlecock Federation) is the organizer, with its offices in Bochum, Germany.

Rep.: Has the Greek team taken part in any European or International event?

Pres.: Despite that the Greek federation, which was recently founded and is in its first few years of operation, in August 2003, and being more specific between 9 and 13 August, the first Greek National Team of Shuttlecock took part in the Hungarian Open Championship and in the Kronebau Cup in Ujszasz, Hungary. However, the most important was the experience that the athletes and the national coach Mr. Dimitri Katakalaios, gained during the games. In October 2003, (3-5 October), our National team traveled to Bochum, Germany, in order to it takes place in the 1st European Shuttlecock Championship. In this championship the National team was more complete since the team consisted of men and women. In Bochum, we accomplished to take the fifth place in the general classification, something very encouraging to all of us.

Rep.: Should we except for a Championship here in Greece?

Pres.: Exactly, we have been working on it for the past six months having exhaust every deadline and having faced enough difficulties, I’m in the pleasant position in announcing that the 1st Pan-Hellenic Shuttlecock Championships will take place in April 18th of this year.

Rep. You spoke about difficulties, what kind of difficulties did you have to resolve?

Pres.: If we exclude the Olympic Games of Athens, and the difficulty of finding an available playing field, the biggest problem of our sport lies in the lack of eagerness for collaboration and support from the mayors and the athletic authorities of the municipalities. However, as a Greek proverb says, "the good lad knows another path". Imagine that we even had to adapt the field dimensions, so that we could find more easily an available playing field.

Rep.: Generally speaking, how do you see the future of the sport?

Pres.: In 2002, Shuttlecock was officially presented as a new sport in the Pan-Asiatic Olympic Games. In 2003, the sport has also been included in the Asiatic games (a kind of Pre - Olympic Games) in Vietnam. Great efforts have are been done by the President of ISF, Mr. Su Jie, who is one of the 10 Members of the Olympic Committee of China, to included the Shuttlecock sport as a new game in the Olympic Games of 2008 in Beijing. We, from our part, as the Greek Federation, we have started processes so the sport will soon be officially recognized by the General Secretariat of Sports of our country.

Rep.: If somebody is interested for this new shuttlecock sport, how can he learn more about it?

Pres.: He can contact any of our associations - members of the Greek Shuttlecock Federation or visit the site of the Federation, www. featherball.net

Rep.: Mr. Stavridis, thank you for your precious help and wish you success in your sport.

Pres.: I thank you with all my heart. Take care.