SIENA – Romain Sato’s switch to Panathinaikos was made official yesterday morning at about 11:30. The news appeared on Panathinaikos’ (Greek section, not in English) sight and was immediately picked up by basketball’s main portals. Well, if this isn’t the biggest hit of the summer of 2010, then it’s second, for obvious reasons, only to Spanoulis’ transfer.  Romain Sato is for all intents and purposes one of Obradovic’s players. And he released his first statements on Pao’s site saying, “I feel lucky. I think Panathinaikos is one of the strangest teams, if not the strongest in Europe. I’m happy about how things went; happy to play in this city for this team. I already know a lot of my new teammates, if not all of them. I know the technical environment well. This is a great opportunity for me. I don’t think a player exists that wouldn’t want to play for Panathinaikos.” Were there any references to his experiences with Siena? No direct ones, but being an interview done by Panathinaikos, that’s understandable. His only mention of Montepaschi was indirenct. “As an adversary I’ve gotten to know the winning mentality that reins on this team. How could I forget the Euroleague playoffs two years ago when they won two games against Siena with such determination.  I’m proud to be part of a winning team and I confess that I don’t mind having my new teammates on my side instead of as opponents.” Who knows? Maybe the idea of bringing Romain Sato to Athens wasn’t born just as an attempt to get revenge for stealing Spanoulis.  Maybe the flame was sparked that March 24th, 2009, the day of playoff game 1, when Panathinaikos moved onto the next round and then because the European champions in Berlin. It ended 90-85 with Sato scoring 29 points topped of with lots of great extras that earned him a stellar index rating: 40. It doesn’t matter that he did so poorly in the other three games: 4 in game 2, 2 in game 3, 5 in game 4. Evidently, Obradovic was already in love. Sato concludes, “What can I bring to the team? I’ll do whatever the coach asks me: defense, offense, rebounds...” We simply must add, all the things he learned to do so well in Siena.