The Most Successful Football Clubs In Greece

When identifying the five most successful clubs in Greece’s present and storied past we begin our journey in 1959, the year when the country’s first national league was formed. Known as the ‘Alpha Ethniki’ it later became rebranded as the Super League.

Prior to the Alpha Ethniki there was the Panhellenic Championships, that ran for three decades, and it will not surprise anyone to learn that Olympiacos dominated back then. In truth, the giants of Piraeus have dominated Greek football from the get-go to current times.

The problem with this early incarnation of structured competition is that it focused solely on clubs from major cities, omitting provincial sides.

In a country that is proudly the cradle of democracy that doesn’t seem very democratic at all.

Sadly, the same can be said of its successor, because across its 65 years of existence the Alpha Ethniki/Super League has given us just five different title winners. Indeed, an astounding 75% of the league championships have been won by either Olympiacos or Panathinaikos.

No prizes for guessing who makes up our top two then.

AEL

Athlitiki Enosi Larissa are the only club beyond Greece’s two major metropolitan areas to have won the league, doing so in 1988. Three years earlier they lifted the Greek Cup, a feat they repeated in 2007. Additionally, they have reached the quarter-finals of the European Cup Winners Cup, narrowly exiting to Dynamo Moscow.

All of which is a credible return for a club founded in 1964 from the debris of four long-defunct local sides.

Yet, are these limited number of achievements enough to have Larissa viewed as the fifth biggest institution in Greece? Again we come back to Greek football’s fundamental problem, it being a small country that contains two sporting behemoths.

Moreover, it shouldn’t be under-estimated just how considerable a feat it was in ’88 to fend off the usual suspects. Turning the football betting on its head, it is recalled as a miracle akin to Leicester topping the Premier League in 2016.

PAOK

Based in the far north of the country, PAOK Thessaloniki played beyond the country’s border in its infancy, in the Macedonia second division, until entry was secured to the Panhellenic Championship in the early Thirties. They were one of the founding members of the National League in 1959 and it’s a proud boast that they have never endured relegation.

It was in the Seventies when their star really began to rise, winning an inaugural title in 1976 bolstered by homegrown fare. They repeated the trick ten years later, an era that also saw them prominent in Europe. A memorable encounter with Bayern Munich in the UEFA Cup went all the way to pens.

In recent seasons, PAOK have doubled their title haul, keeping Olympiacos at bay in 2019 before attaining a fourth league crown just last May. On the final day of the season only three points separated the top three, the White-Black holding their nerve.

Celebrations in the Toumba Stadium that afternoon was raucous to put it mildly, with PAOK blessed by having one of the most passionate fan-bases in world football. It is a ground infamous for its hostile atmosphere and appropriately Hells Bells by ACDC blasts out prior to every game.

AEK Athens

AEK have done more than anyone to ensure that Greek football isn’t a complete duopoly, claiming 11 titles since 1959 and impressively spreading out their gains, only failing to top their peers in one of the league’s seven decades of existence.

That was in the 2000s when financial problems came to the fore, a situation that ultimately resulted in relegation and ignominy. A points deduction following a pitch invasion was a real low point.

From that, AEK took stock and made the drastic decision to self-relegate themselves, reverting back to amateur status in an attempt to start over from scratch. To that point the club had made it a trait to lure household names who perhaps were past their best, all for big money. Rivaldo’s arrival in 2007 epitomised this.

Leaner and majority-owned by a non-profit organisation, the club re-emerged all the better for their transformation, gaining promotion back to the top-flight and challenging the elite again, this time on a firmer financial footing. League titles were won in 2017 and 2023.

Panathinaikos

Known among their brethren as the ‘Great Club’, Panathinaikos won their first title way back in 1930 and were central to proceedings when Greek football gradually became professionalised.

It was when the National League took hold though when the Athens superclub really came into their own, dominating the landscape across the opening era. Between 1960 and 1972 they won the league eight times, all while adding numerous Greek Cups into the mix. In 1963/64 they went through their entire campaign unbeaten.

Naturally such an iconic institution has been blessed with some majestic talent through the ages. There was Mimis Domazos, the ‘General’ who guided the Greens to a European Cup final in 1971. There was Antonis Antoniadis, who would be a scourge of the live betting markets these days, he being lethal from a half-chance. The striker finished top scorer in the Greek top-flight on five occasions.

In more recent times, Gate 13 – the club’s ultra contingent – took great pride in seeing five Panathinaikos players start when Greece won the 2004 Euros against all expectations.

Olympiacos

With 15 Panhellenic Championships secured, Olympiacos were always going to be a major player around the time of the National League’s formation. It is a measure of their stature and sustained excellence however that such dominance has never wavered through the decades, remaining to this day Greece’s biggest, best and most successful football club.

Two titles were claimed in the Sixties. Three in the Seventies. The Eighties brought five league crowns and the Nineties produced another trio.

Post-Millenium however, we have witnessed a quantum leap that astonishes. The club nicknamed ‘Thrylos’ (‘Legend’) have only failed to ultimately finish top on five occasions since 2000.

A seemingly endless plethora of great players have cemented their superiority, not least Grigoris Georgatos, Nikos Anastopoulos, and Giovanni in modern times.