With a name inspired by the ancient spear of the Macedonian phalanx, the Saris of Florina have made the prefecture of Akritia the “home” of table tennis. And even if they do not have their own “home” and use the lyceum gymnasium as their headquarters, but, nevertheless, they advertise Greek table tennis throughout Europe. In fact, they recently brought the silver medal of the European Women’s Trophy to Theodoros Angelopoulos’ beloved “Land of Lakes”.

Florina refers to the films of the famous Greek director as film lovers. The banks of the Sakulev River, fog, foggy and rainy weather, the old railway station with red tiles and this loneliness of the wet landscape are captured in the films of the famous director.

And yet, Florina also means table tennis. For the last 14 years “Sarises” have been active in the prefecture of Akritiko. The club has a lot of success at the championship level, and it also stands out in the development categories thanks to good infrastructure.

“Our classes start at the age of five. The largest “volume” of our athletes are athletes from the 3rd category and below. This is what we pay the most attention to,” club president Giorgos Liguras told kathimerini.gr.

When we asked him about the reasons why Florina gained such popularity in a sport that was not widely played among Greek sports fans, he replied: “In the 70s we were a group that played table tennis in funeral parlors, in a catechetical school, etc. There was no club in the city. This group matured and met again on the occasion of the championship organized by the Church of Agios Nikolaos. We were jealous because there were table tennis clubs in neighboring prefectures and we decided to start Sarises. The name comes from an ancient Macedonian spear. We have used the plural to show teamwork and since the javelin always goes forward, that is the goal of the club, which was founded in 2009. At first it was only men. Gradually, the children came, we hired a coach, focused on quality, and development began.”

Championship without a stadium

The women’s team of the Sarises club is the only regional team that adequately opposes the historical clubs of Athens (Olympiacos, Panathinaikos, AEK). In fact, this season he took 2nd place in the A1 standings. Her progress in European “salons” is also enviable. He participated in the European Cup three times, which, after the Champions League, is the largest championship of the European federation. This year, Sarises took second place in the European Trophy.

This year the men have been promoted to the B national championship and will qualify for promotion to A2. “Winter also helps us in the development of sports. It’s a sport that is played indoors and the winter is hard here,” the president of the club told us.

However, the Sarises also promote Florina by organizing international sporting events. The beautiful Macedonian city hosted, among other things, the European Cup Groups, the International Table Tennis Festival and the Pan-Greek Championships. “The local community loves us and supports us. When we play a home match, the stadium fills up. Our goal is to have our own space to be independent. Now we are located in the gymnasium of the secondary school and must collect the tables,” said Mr. Liguras.

Members of the “Sarises” club compete in the national teams and have distinguished themselves in competitions with their talent and love for sports. More than 40 children are engaged in the section of the academy, who are trained by a professional trainer.

“We have bitterness from the General Secretariat for Sports because it does not consider table tennis as a team sport and therefore the clubs do not receive any funding. The sport operates as a team and takes part in competitions such as Champions League etc. GGA however it does not fund tennis clubs to compete in European competitions. So, what we have achieved in Europe for the GGA as if it didn’t exist, ”he plaintively remarked.

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