Andreas Zafiropoulos

Andreas Zafiropoulos (Greek: Ανδρέας Ζαφειρόπουλος) is a Greek businessman and was the major shareholder of AEK Athens F.C. for eleven years, from 1981 to 1992. During this time, he sometimes gave up the presidency and management, but always kept the shares. During his days, AEK won 2 Championships and 1 Cup a Super Cup and a League Cup. In 1992 he sold the shares of the club to the duo Dimitris Melissanidis and Giannis Karras. Since then he has not been actively involved with AEK, but from time to time he participates in various events and actions of the team.

Early life

Zafiropoulos, originally from Kiato of Corinthia, studied economics at the then ASOEE. In 1963 he, alongside his brother, Panagiotis, took over from their father, Ioannis, the ownership of his sporting goods company "Zita Hellas", which during its heyday was the largest of this sector in Greece.^[1] Zafiropoulos was also referred to by the media as "Mr. Zita" or simply "Zita", due to his company.^[2]

AEK Athens

After the resignation of Loukas Barlos from the ownership of AEK Athens in June 1981 Zafiropoulos stepped in and took the wheel of the club.^[3][4] His ownership was marked by administrative changes and successive changes of managers on their bench.^[5] Despite his huge wealth, he could not compete financially with either the Vardinogiannis family that owned Panathinaikos, or the group of shipowners that owned Olympiacos led by Stavros Daifas. Nevertheless he brought players such as Hristo Bonev, Håkan Sandberg and Márton Esterházy.^[6] In the summer of 1982, he stepped out of the presidency of AEK Athens due to the "displeasure" of the fans. He retained the team's shares, but handed over the management of the team to the shipowner and a long associate of Loukas Barlos, Michalis Arkadis. At the end of the season AEK won the Greek Cup, with Arkadis taking most of the credit. In the summer of 1984, he returned to the administrative activities of the club and took over the presidency for the last time. With the overwhelming majority of the fans against, he handed over the management of club to the nightclub owner, Stratos Gidopoulos in June 1988. The later made one of the most important moves in the history of the club and brought the former player, Dušan Bajević in the position of the manager. That marked the beginning of a new era in the club; Bajević would become the AEK Athens' most successful manager. In his first season at the club AEK also won the Championship, sealing the title in the penultimate matchday with the famous 0–1 away victory over Olympiacos, with a goal by Takis Karagiozopoulos. This was the first league title of his ownership and the first of the club after 10 years. Yet again, Zafiropoulos was overshadowed by Gidopoulos. With Bajević on the bench AEK won the Greek Super Cup in 1989 the Greek League Cup in 1990 and another Championship in 1992.^[7] With Zafiropoulos not being able to bear the financial weight of the club since the previous seasons, the duo Melissanidis-Karras expressed interest in the purchase of his shares and on 17 June 1992 they officially became the new owners of the club.^[8]

Conflicts

In 1987, Zafiropoulos and the then coach of AEK, Nikos Alefantos, were accused by a section of the fans, of having organized and methodized, with disparaging statements and publications, the expulsion of Thomas Mavros from the team. The press of the time wrote a lot about Zafiropoulos and Alefantos' conflicts with Mavros, and in fact some newspapers claimed that there were even political reasons for the conflict.^[9] On 15 May 1988, during the last match of the season at Nea Filadelfeia against Iraklis, the ultras had enough with Zafiropoulos, who considered him unable to lift the "weight" of handling the club. As a result riot police, in an incomprehensible decision, entered the ultras stand and beat whoever stood in front of them which resulted in very heated encounters with the ultras. There were many who believe that Zafiropoulos influenced the police officers to act in this way.^[10][11]

Political affiliations

Zafiropoulos was also politically active as a PASOK official, and believed he could use his government connections to help AEK. Indeed, his relationship with leading government and party officials helped the group, mainly in financial facilities and loans, but in general at that time the factor with the best relations with the government (and personally with Andreas Papandreou) was Yiorgos Vardinogiannis of Panathinaikos.^[12]

References