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| Version 1 | Version 2 |
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| No run on the banks in Athens, but Greeks now want compromise | No run on the banks in Athens, but Greeks now want compromise |
| (about 14 hours later) | |
| It was not what anyone would call a panic. The banks were all open, the cashpoints were dispensing notes, the cafes were busy, the sesame-seed bagel stands doing a brisk morning trade. | It was not what anyone would call a panic. The banks were all open, the cashpoints were dispensing notes, the cafes were busy, the sesame-seed bagel stands doing a brisk morning trade. |
| But as rumours swirled of multibillion-euro cash injections and possible bank closures by Monday, a steady stream of people – though never enough to call a queue – were withdrawing money from the National Bank branch on Athens’s central Syntagma Square. | But as rumours swirled of multibillion-euro cash injections and possible bank closures by Monday, a steady stream of people – though never enough to call a queue – were withdrawing money from the National Bank branch on Athens’s central Syntagma Square. |
| “Yes, I’m worried,” said Dimitris, who works for an insurance company and, given that he had just taken out €1,000 (£712) in €50 notes, was understandably reluctant to supply a surname. | “Yes, I’m worried,” said Dimitris, who works for an insurance company and, given that he had just taken out €1,000 (£712) in €50 notes, was understandably reluctant to supply a surname. |
| “I’m worried because this is now starting to get really very uncertain indeed. The government is not telling us what it will do, how it intends to solve this thing. I am making sure I have enough for the first part of next week. Just in case.” | “I’m worried because this is now starting to get really very uncertain indeed. The government is not telling us what it will do, how it intends to solve this thing. I am making sure I have enough for the first part of next week. Just in case.” |
| With the headline in Friday’s Kathimerini newspaper warning that the Bank of Greece had asked the European Central Bank for €3.5bn of emergency funding to shore up some €3.2bn of deposits that have haemorrhaged from Greece’s largest bank since Monday, some customers were holding back out of principle. | With the headline in Friday’s Kathimerini newspaper warning that the Bank of Greece had asked the European Central Bank for €3.5bn of emergency funding to shore up some €3.2bn of deposits that have haemorrhaged from Greece’s largest bank since Monday, some customers were holding back out of principle. |
| Related: Tsipras does want a deal, as the alternative is unthinkable | Related: Tsipras does want a deal, as the alternative is unthinkable |
| “I don’t feel 100% secure, that’s certainly true,” said Giota Georgiades, who works for a timber and paper import agency. “But I don’t want to take all I have out of the bank. If everyone did that, the whole banking system would collapse.” | “I don’t feel 100% secure, that’s certainly true,” said Giota Georgiades, who works for a timber and paper import agency. “But I don’t want to take all I have out of the bank. If everyone did that, the whole banking system would collapse.” |
| Like almost everyone at the cashpoint, Georgiades – who had withdrawn just €30, “enough for today and maybe tomorrow” – said she was confident a way out would be found from her country’s face-off with its creditors: its eurozone partners, the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund. | Like almost everyone at the cashpoint, Georgiades – who had withdrawn just €30, “enough for today and maybe tomorrow” – said she was confident a way out would be found from her country’s face-off with its creditors: its eurozone partners, the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund. |
| “I’m optimistic,” she said. “They will arrive at a solution. It is in no one’s interests for Greece to fall over the edge. But it had better be found soon now. It had better be found really soon. Now there is almost no more time left.” | “I’m optimistic,” she said. “They will arrive at a solution. It is in no one’s interests for Greece to fall over the edge. But it had better be found soon now. It had better be found really soon. Now there is almost no more time left.” |
| A raft of recent opinion polls has shown that while the leftist Syriza-led government of the prime minister, Alexis Tsipras, still holds a commanding lead over its nearest rivals, there are signs of growing popular unease over the way it has handled the negotiations. | A raft of recent opinion polls has shown that while the leftist Syriza-led government of the prime minister, Alexis Tsipras, still holds a commanding lead over its nearest rivals, there are signs of growing popular unease over the way it has handled the negotiations. |
| Membership Event: Guardian Newsroom: Should Greece leave the Euro? | |
| Tsipras is holding out against a number of key reforms demanded by the creditors in exchange for the release of Greece’s remaining €7.2bn of bailout funds before the end of the month, when Athens is due to repay some €1.6bn in IMF loans. | Tsipras is holding out against a number of key reforms demanded by the creditors in exchange for the release of Greece’s remaining €7.2bn of bailout funds before the end of the month, when Athens is due to repay some €1.6bn in IMF loans. |
| The government argues that implementing the proposals, which include cutting pensions and raising some taxes in a bid to achieve a 1% budget surplus in the middle of deep recession, would mean breaking its campaign promises and aggravating Greece’s economic and humanitarian crisis. | The government argues that implementing the proposals, which include cutting pensions and raising some taxes in a bid to achieve a 1% budget surplus in the middle of deep recession, would mean breaking its campaign promises and aggravating Greece’s economic and humanitarian crisis. |
| But polls indicate that as the on-off negotiations drag tortuously on and the country edges gradually closer to defaulting on its mountain of debts and possibly being ejected from the eurozone, more and more people would like their government to seek a compromise. | But polls indicate that as the on-off negotiations drag tortuously on and the country edges gradually closer to defaulting on its mountain of debts and possibly being ejected from the eurozone, more and more people would like their government to seek a compromise. |
| Asked this week by the GPO polling firm to choose between a “bad deal” and remaining in the euro, or no deal at all and a return to the drachma, more than 56% of respondents said they would prefer a bad deal. Some 70% also said they believed the standoff would end with the government climbing down. | Asked this week by the GPO polling firm to choose between a “bad deal” and remaining in the euro, or no deal at all and a return to the drachma, more than 56% of respondents said they would prefer a bad deal. Some 70% also said they believed the standoff would end with the government climbing down. |
| Related: 'It’s going to be bad, whatever happens': Greece on edge as eurozone exit looms | Related: 'It’s going to be bad, whatever happens': Greece on edge as eurozone exit looms |
| “For me, to be honest, almost any kind of deal – within limits – would be better than no deal now, just as long as we stay in the euro,” said Vassili Michaelides, a systems analyst, who had just taken out six €50 notes. | “For me, to be honest, almost any kind of deal – within limits – would be better than no deal now, just as long as we stay in the euro,” said Vassili Michaelides, a systems analyst, who had just taken out six €50 notes. |
| “It’s all right, the government has shown that they are prepared to stand up to the institutions. They have not gone down on their knees and signed the first piece of paper they were given, like previous Greek governments. That’s already progress.” | “It’s all right, the government has shown that they are prepared to stand up to the institutions. They have not gone down on their knees and signed the first piece of paper they were given, like previous Greek governments. That’s already progress.” |
| But it was time now to make “a few concessions – not the biggest ones, perhaps, not the ones that nobody here will accept, but enough to seal a deal,” Michaelides said. “Keep their heads high, but come home with an agreement. Because really, nobody in Greece can take this for very much longer.” | But it was time now to make “a few concessions – not the biggest ones, perhaps, not the ones that nobody here will accept, but enough to seal a deal,” Michaelides said. “Keep their heads high, but come home with an agreement. Because really, nobody in Greece can take this for very much longer.” |