1963–64 AEK Athens F.C. season explained

The 1963–64 season was the 40th season in the existence of AEK Athens F.C. and the fifth consecutive season in the top flight of Greek football. They competed in the Alpha Ethniki, the Greek Cup and the European Cup. The season began on 15 September 1963 and finished on 17 June 1964.

Overview

The management of AEK Athens, in the summer of 1963, proceeded with a brave restructuring of the team's roster. The Syrian Ibrahim Mughrabi returned to his homeland, Thanasis Gouvas and the Cypriots, Panikos Krystallis and Dimitris Zagylos left, while Giannis Marditsis, after his participation in the first match against Monaco, effectively withdrew from the team. Several players were added to the roster, such as the goalkeeper, Theodoros Maniateas from Panthisiakos and Panagiotis Charalambidis from Iraklis, the striker of Atromitos, Kostas Papageorgiou and most importantly, Fanis Tasinos who emerged as the best left midfielder of the previous season with Pagkorinthiakos. Along with the renewal of the roster, the administration of yellow–blacks surprised everyone by removing from the technical leadership Jenő Csaknády, the coach who crowned them Champion in the previous season. The Austrian Heinrich Müller was hired in his place. One of the first innovations under the new coach was the "removal of permanency" in the position under the goalposts, of the team's main goalkeeper Stelios Serafidis and the promotion to the starting eleven of the then substitute goalkeeper, Vangelis Petrakis.

AEK started their competitive obligations, playing for the first time in their history in the UEFA competitions, as they qualified in the preliminary round of the European Cup, having won the championship of the previous season. The draw brought them against the French champions, Monaco. The first appearance in a UEFA match quickly turned into a nightmare as they faced an imposing 7–2 defeat at Stade Municipal du Ray, on 18 September.^[1] The rematch in Athens on 2 October, was purely procedural, as 1–1 draw couldn't change anything in the qualification outcome, as it was secured by the Monegasques from the first match.^[2]

AEK started the championship race with 3 losses and 1 draw conceding a total of 8 goals in these games. Taking into account the 7–2 defeat in the team's maiden European appearance in Monaco, Serafidis returned to the starting eleven, but precious ground had been already lost in the title race. In the next 14 Championship matches, the yellow–blacks conceded only 3 goals, 2 of which in their fourth defeat in Drama against Doxa Drama, which gave a greater advantage to the advancing Panathinaikos. AEK eventually finished in third place in the table, 13 points from the top. The 72 goals they achieved won them the best attack, while after 4 consecutive firsts of Kostas Nestoridis, the title of the top scorer of the league "passed" to Mimis Papaioannou, who with 29 goals kept the award within the club.^[3]

In the Greek Cup AEK eliminated Anagennisi Arta by crushing them away from home on 26 April with 0–7. The round of 16 brought AEK against PAOK again away from home on 24 May, where AEK won 0–3 in extra time, after the 0–0 at the regular time. The away matches continued in the quarter-finals, where AEK faced Proodeftiki on 3 June at Karaiskakis Stadium and eliminated them by 0–1. The draw for the semi-finals brought Panathinaikos and Olympiacos against each other at Leoforos Alexandras Stadium and Pierikos against AEK in Katerini. On 17 June the clearly superior AEK won by 1–3 and easily advanced to the final. In the other semi-final, which was held on the same day, a derby took place that was destined to go down in history for non-competitive reasons and characterized as the "Holocaust of Leoforos". After the match ended a draw at the regular time and the relaxed tempo by all players during the second half, as well as the extra time, enraged the crowd of fans of both teams and now certain that the match was fixed for a replay match to be set, broke the railings, destroyed the billboards and floodlights of the stadium and invaded the pitch. There they gathered all the wooden objects and set them on fire, and then attacked football players, referees and coaches, together and without getting involved with each other. The police did everything they could, but with the extent of the incidents, the intervention of the public prosecutor was called for.^[4] The HFF punished both teams for the events and fearing worse incidents, did not set one and recognized the finalist AEK, as the winner of the tournament by declaring it to UEFA as the country's representative in the organization for the next season's European Cup Winners' Cup.^[5] Many years later the HFF, recognizing the unjustified gap that had been created, awarded the trophy to AEK as well.^[6]

Players

Squad information

NOTE: The players are the ones that have been announced by the AEK Athens' press release. No edits should be made unless a player arrival or exit is announced. Updated 17 June 1964, 23:59 UTC+2.

Player	Nat.	Position(s)	Date of birth (Age)	Signed	Previous club	Transfer fee	Contract until
Goalkeepers
Stelios Serafidis		GK	June 30, 1964	1953	AEK Athens U20	—	1972
Vangelis Petrakis		GK	June 30, 1964	1962	Aris	Free	1967
Defenders
Giannis Marditsis		CB / ST	June 30, 1964	1959	Egaleo	₯103,000	1964
Mimis Anastasiadis		RB / CB / ST	June 30, 1964	1956	A.O. Nea Ionia	Free	1964
Alekos Sofianidis		LB / LM / LW	June 30, 1964	1959	Beşiktaş	Free	1969
Aleko Yordan		CB	June 30, 1964	1962	Beykoz	Free	1969
Manolis Kanellopoulos		RB / CB	June 30, 1964	1962	Egaleo	Free	1965
Theofilos Vernezis		RB / CB / GK		1956	AEK Athens U20	—	1965
Panagiotis Charalampidis		CB / DM	June 30, 1964	1963	Iraklis	Free	1966
Panagiotis Stasinopoulos		CB		1963	AEK Athens U20	—	1969
Midfielders
Miltos Papapostolou		DM / CB	June 30, 1964	1956	Egaleo	Free	1965
Giorgos Petridis		AM / SS / ST	June 30, 1964	1957	Pera Club	Free	1966
Stelios Skevofilakas		LM / RM / AM	June 30, 1964	1960	Eleftheroupoli	Free	1972
Sofos Koulidis		CM / AM		1962	Egaleo	Free	1965
Emilios Theofanidis		CM / CB	June 30, 1964	1963	Aris Ptolemaidas	Free	1965
Fanis Tasinos		LM / CM	June 30, 1964	1963	Korinthos	₯500,000	1966
Michalis Simigdalas		CM	June 30, 1964	1963	AEK Athens U20	—	1969
Giorgos Karafeskos		CM / DM / RM / RW	June 30, 1964	1963	AEK Athens U20	—	1974
Forwards
Kostas Nestoridis		ST / SS	June 30, 1964	1955	Panionios	Free	1966
Andreas Stamatiadis (Captain)		RW / LW / SS / ST	June 30, 1964	1952	AEK Athens U20	—	1969
Aris Tsachouridis		LW / LM / RM / RW	June 30, 1964	1960	Makedonikos	Free	1965
Kostas Papageorgiou		ST	June 30, 1964	1963	Atromitos	₯200,000	1969
Mimis Papaioannou		SS / ST / AM	June 30, 1964	1962	Veria	₯175,000	1970
Spyros Pomonis		LW / LM	June 30, 1964	1960	AEK Athens U20	—	1973
Nikos Sevastopoulos		RW / SS / AM / ST	June 30, 1964	1963	AEK Athens U20	—	1971

Transfers

In

	width=200 style="background:#FFDE00	Player	width=200 style="background:#FFDE00	From	width=150 style="background:#FFDE00	Fee	width=150 style="background:#FFDE00	Date	width=150 style="background:#FFDE00	Contract Until	Source
		Iraklis	Free transfer		30 June 1966
		AEK Athens U20	Promotion		30 June 1969
		AEK Athens U20	Promotion		30 June 1969
		Aris Ptolemaidas	Free transfer		30 June 1965
		Korinthos	₯500,000		30 June 1966
		AEK Athens U20	Promotion		30 June 1974
		AEK Athens U20	Promotion		30 June 1971
		Atromitos	₯200,000		30 June 1969	[7]

Out

	width=200 style="background:#FFDE00	Player	width=200 style="background:#FFDE00	To	width=150 style="background:#FFDE00	Fee	width=150 style="background:#FFDE00	Date	Source
		Free agent	Contract termination
		Free agent	End of contract
		Panegialios	Free transfer
		Panachaiki	Free transfer
		Chicago Olympic	Free transfer
		Apollon Limassol	Free transfer
		Anorthosis Famagusta	Free transfer
		Al Ahli	End of contract
		Panachaiki	Free transfer
		Free agent	End of contract

Overall transfer activity

Expenditure: ₯700,000

Income: ₯0

Net Total: ₯700,000

Competitions

Alpha Ethniki

See main article: 1963–64 Alpha Ethniki.

Fixtures

Greek Cup

See main article: 1963–64 Greek Football Cup.

AEK entered the Greek Cup at the round of 32.

Matches

As Panathinaikos and Olympiacos were ejected from the competition, the final was scratched and AEK Athens were awarded the cup.

European Cup

See main article: 1963–64 European Cup.

Preliminary round

Statistics

Squad statistics

! colspan="11" style="background:#FFDE00; text-align:center" | Goalkeepers|-! colspan="11" style="background:#FFDE00; color:black; text-align:center;"| Defenders|-! colspan="11" style="background:#FFDE00; color:black; text-align:center;"| Midfielders|-! colspan="11" style="background:#FFDE00; color:black; text-align:center;"| Forwards|-|}

Goalscorers

Rank		width=200 style="background:#FFDE00	Player	width=120 style="background:#FFDE00	Alpha Ethniki	width=120 style="background:#FFDE00	Greek Cup	width=120 style="background:#FFDE00	European Cup	width=120 style="background:#FFDE00	Total
1			29	5	0	34
2			20	2	0	22
3			10	4	1	15
4			4	0	1	5
5			4	0	0	4
6			1	2	0	3
7			1	1	0	2
8			1	0	0	1
			1	0	0	1
			0	0	1	1
Own goals	1	0	0	1
Totals	72	14	3	89

Hat-tricks

Numbers in superscript represent the goals that the player scored.

width=200 style="background:#FFDE00	Player	width=200 style="background:#FFDE00	Against	width=70 style="background:#FFDE00	Result	width=150 style="background:#FFDE00	Date	width=150 style="background:#FFDE00	Competition	Source
Mimis Papaioannou		3–0 (H)	20 October 1963	Alpha Ethniki
Mimis Papaioannou		4–0 (H)	8 December 1963	Alpha Ethniki
Mimis Papaioannou		7–0 (Α)	26 April 1964	Greek Cup

Clean sheets

The list is sorted by competition order when total clean sheets are equal and then alphabetically by surname. Clean sheets in games where both goalkeepers participated are awarded to the goalkeeper who started the game. Goalkeepers with no appearances are not included.

Rank	width=200 style="background:#FFDE00	Player	width=120 style="background:#FFDE00	Alpha Ethniki	width=120 style="background:#FFDE00	Greek Cup	width=120 style="background:#FFDE00	European Cup	width=120 style="background:#FFDE00	Total
1		17	3	0	20
2		0	0	0	9
Totals	17	3	0	20

Disciplinary record

|-! colspan="17" style="background:#FFDE00; text-align:center" | Goalkeepers|-! colspan="17" style="background:#FFDE00; color:black; text-align:center;"| Defenders|-! colspan="17" style="background:#FFDE00; color:black; text-align:center;"| Midfielders|-! colspan="17" style="background:#FFDE00; color:black; text-align:center;"| Forwards|}

External links

• AEK Athens F.C. Official Website
• A.E.K. FC Database

Notes and References

1. Web site: Monaco-AEK UEFA Champions League 1963/64. UEFA.com.
2. Web site: AEK-Monaco UEFA Champions League 1963/64. UEFA.com.
3. Web site: Greece - Final Tables 1959-1999. RSSSF.
4. Web site: Ο "ημιτελικός - ολοκαύτωμα" στη Λεωφόρο. 17 June 2020. sdna.gr.
5. Web site: Κύπελλο 1961-1970. epo.gr.
6. Web site: Περίοδος 1963-1964. 19 May 2015. aekpedia.com. el.
7. Web site: Οι 22 ποδοσφαιριστές, που συνδέουν ΑΕΚ και Ατρόμητο. 30 April 2011. aek365.org.