Barbarouses goes back to his roots

Barbarouses, who has a Greek background but is a New Zealand international, quit Brisbane Roar soon after the 2011 grand final to try his luck in Russia.

Barbarouses signed a three-year contract but he played only 13 times for Alania, scoring twice.

When an opportunity came up to trade the Black Sea for the Aegean he did not think twice before accepting an offer to join Greek giant Panathinaikos on loan.

After a week of pre-season training Barbarouses has left Athens to join up with New Zealand's Olympic squad for a camp in Japan.

”Pre-season has been very good so far and it's going well. We have a young team coming through because the club is trying to rebuild,” he said before boarding a plane in Athens bound for Tokyo.

”I'm enjoying it here. Athens is a big city and I feel very much at home. I can speak the language, of course.

”Athens is very hot at the moment and you get the other extreme in winter in Russia which makes it very hard to play football. It's a big difference.

”At the time of leaving Brisbane I thought that joining a Russian club which was close to Europe and which played in a strong competition was a good opportunity for me.

”All I wanted was to do what was best for me and try to get as far as I could. That was what I was aiming for.

”I hope my luck (with games) will improve at Panathinaikos. Things are looking good and hopefully when we get closer to the start of the season they will get even better.

”Panathinaikos will play in the qualifiers for the Champions League and if we get through it would be fantastic.”

Barbarouses, whose father Nick is Greek and a lifelong Panathinaikos supporter, has done a lot of travelling the last few weeks and he conceded that trying to juggle a new jet-setting lifestyle can be demanding.

After ending his commitments in Vladikavkaz he flew to the Solomon Islands to play for New Zealand's senior team in its ill-fated Oceania Nations Cup campaign that ended in a shock semi-final loss to unheralded New Caledonia.

Then after a short break he was off to Athens to join Panathinaikos.

This week he will be in Japan before the team flies to Britain for the Olympics

And no sooner will he re-join Panathinaikos after the Games then he would travel to New Zealand twice if selected to play for the All Whites in four qualifiers for the 2014 FIFA World Cup campaign.

Barbarouses is only 22 and he probably feels his body can take anything modern football can throw at him.

The truth is that he would not have it any other way.

”It is tiring, of course, but you have only a short career in football so there is not much point spending the time complaining about the constant travel,” he said.

”The way I see it is that I have to do the best I can.

”Losing to New Caledonia in the Nations Cup was hugely disappointing but at least we are still in the running for the World Cup.

”That's the major thing we are trying to achieve.”