It was yesterday reported that Greece had made some progress with its creditors as the deadline for its loan repayment to the IMF looms darkly on the horizon.

But has progress really been made? Or is it just a case of dragging out the inevitable? Talks between the Tsipras government and the Brussels Group – the eurozone, the IMF and the European Central Bank are set to continue, however things are being cut very fine.

Greece needs to come up with a series of economic reforms, but it seems that a brick wall was hit last week as EU Finance Ministers, Malta’s included, said that there was a total communications breakdown with Greece. Her Finance Minister, Yanis Varoufakis, has been labelled a time-waster, an amateur and worse. In the fallout of that meeting, Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras reshuffled the negotiating team, and seemingly sidelines Varoufakis, who is become steadily more unpopular in Greece.

The Finance Minister, known for his refusal to wear a tie, has been accosted in restaurants and ridiculed publically for seeming to be more interested in magazine shoots in his fancy home that he does in saving Greece from bankruptcy.

And that is what will happen if Greece does not come up with a series of economic reforms and budget measures that are deemed acceptable by creditors in order to secure the remaining money in its bailout fund — €7.2 billion.

Without the money, Greece faces the possibility of going bankrupt in the coming weeks, putting up controls on the free flow of capital and an exit from the euro. Its next big repayment is a €750 million payment due to the IMF on May 12.

Some Greeks believe that exiting the eurozone will be their salvation, with the re-minting of the drachma allowing the Syriza government to end austerity measures and readjust it’s exchange rate. But the reality is that leaving the urozone will not only be damaging to Greece’s credibility, but it will also be a huge blow to the eurozone. If Greece left the eurozone, it would most likely trigger capital flight, which would mean that the government would have to enact emergency legislation to prevent that from happening.

Currency devaluation could provide long-term opportunities for Greece to increase competitiveness in global markets. But it could also create rapid inflation as prices soar on basic goods and the lifetime savings would simply become worthless.

But the biggest loser in a Grexit scenario would be the European Central Bank. Because the European Monetary Union was intended to be permanent, so there's no organized process for leaving the eurozone. And this is where the ECB is in a catch-22 situation. It is there to preserve and regulate the eurozone, and as such must everything to ensure there is no Grexit. But at the same time, it cannot allow Greece to default on its debts.

A Greek exit would also spook the private sectors and could lead to contagion, once more, in countries such as Portugal, Italy, Spain and Cyprus. In other words, the cost of Greece’s default would hurt the whole eurozone. But with a collapse of GDP and international trade, it would hurt Greece and Greeks even more. This is why the next round of talks cannot fail.