Olympiacos F.C. is a Greek football club based in Piraeus. It has a long presence in UEFA competitions, making its debut on 13 September 1959, against AC Milan for the 1959–60 European Cup, the first Greek club to compete in a UEFA–sanctioned European competition. It also won the UEFA Europa Conference League in the 2023–24 season against Fiorentina, becoming the first Greek club to win a European competition.
Olympiacos is the most successful Greek football club in European competitions, being the only club from Greece in history to have won a major European trophy; they won the UEFA Europa Conference League in 2023–24, sealing their title by winning against Italian side Fiorentina 1–0 in the Final. With their 2024 triumph, they became the first club outside the biggest four European leagues (Premier League, Serie A, La Liga and Bundesliga) to win a UEFA competition since 2011.
They are the highest ranked Greek club in the UEFA rankings, occupying the 36th place in the ten-year ranking, and the 43rd in the five-year ranking as of 2024. They are also the Greek club with the most wins in all European competitions, leading also the table with the most home and away wins, and the Greek team with the most games played in European level, celebrating their 200th match on 23 February 2010, against Bordeaux in the 2009–10 UEFA Champions League first knockout round. Olympiacos also holds the all-time record attendance for a Greek club of 75,263 in a 1982–83 European Cup match against Hamburg at the Athens Olympic Stadium. They are one of the founding members of the European Club Association.
Besides their 2023–24 UEFA Conference League triumph, other major European successes include their advance to the quarter-finals of the UEFA Champions League in 1998–99, where they lost a semi-final spot in the dying minutes to Juventus and their advance to the quarter-finals of the UEFA Cup Winners' Cup in 1992–93, losing to Atlético Madrid.
Olympiacos has eliminated (in either finals, knockout matches or group stages) clubs like Milan, Arsenal, Ajax, Benfica, Porto, Borussia Dortmund, Lazio, Celtic, PSV Eindhoven, Aston Villa, Werder Bremen, Fiorentina, Anderlecht, Monaco, Deportivo La Coruña, Hertha BSC, Cagliari and Standard Liège among many others. They have spent most of their European history in the UEFA Champions League, where they are widely known for being a strong home side, having run some long-standing sequences, such as the 15 straight UEFA Champions League unbeaten home matches since their debut in the tournament under its new format, when Manchester United stopped their record in their fifth consecutive participation, and their 15 wins in 19 UEFA Champions League home matches between 2009–10 and 2014–15. They have a vast record of home wins over traditional European powerhouses and UEFA Champions League winners like Real Madrid, Milan, Liverpool, Manchester United, Ajax, Juventus, Arsenal, Borussia Dortmund, Benfica, Porto, PSV Eindhoven, Celtic, Aston Villa, Olympique Lyonnais, Olympique Marseille, Atlético Madrid, Valencia, Sevilla, Leverkusen and Red Star Belgrade among many others. From 2007 to 2016, Olympiacos participated seven times in the UEFA Champions League Group Stage, and gathered at least 9 points in every one of those seven groups, qualifying three times for the knockout stage (Last 16) of the competition (2007–08, 2009–10, 2013–14).
Olympiacos has also won the Balkans Cup in 1963, at a time when the competition was considered the second most important in the region after the European Cup, becoming the first ever Greek club to win an international competition.
Another major European success was achieved by Olympiacos U-19 team in 2023–24 season. One month before Olympiacos won the 2023–24 UEFA Europa Conference League, Olympiacos U-19 team won the UEFA Youth League against AC Milan in the final, eliminating Inter Milan, Bayern Munich and Nantes in the process. Thus, Olympiacos won two out of four official UEFA club competitions of the 2023–24 season and became the only club in European football to have won two UEFA competitions at the same season.
History Club Total Titles Olympiacos F.C.-1-1--XXXX2
First Greek club to play in the European competitions: Olympiacos–Milan (1959) Olympiacos has a long presence in UEFA competitions, debuting on 13 September 1959 against Milan for the 1959–60 European Cup, being the first Greek club to participate in the European competitions. The first leg was held at Olympiacos home ground in Piraeus, with approximately 20,000 Olympiacos fans crowding Karaiskakis Stadium and creating an intense atmosphere. Olympiacos took the lead with a goal by Kostas Papazoglou (1–0), which was the first goal ever scored by a Greek club and by a Greek player as well in European competitions. Milan's prolific goalscorer José Altafini equalised the match with a header in the 33rd minute, after a cross by Giancarlo Danova. Ilias Yfantis scored an outstanding goal and gave Olympiacos the lead again in the 45th minute of the game, when he controlled the ball between Cesare Maldini and Vincenzo Occhetta and unleashed a powerful volley, burying the ball into the back of the net (2–1). Altafini scored his second goal once again with a header (72nd minute), after a free-kick by Nils Liedholm.
The match ended 2–2, with Olympiacos putting in a great performance against the Italian champions, despite the fact that they had no foreign players in their roster, while Milan had four world-class foreign players, such as Altafini, Liedholm, Juan Alberto Schiaffino and Ernesto Grillo. In the second leg Milan won 3–1 (Giancarlo Danova 12', 26', 85'–Ilias Yfantis 68') and qualified for the next round, despite Olympiacos strong performance especially in the second half.
Balkans Cup Winners (1963) In 1963, Olympiacos became the first ever Greek club to win a non-domestic competition, winning the Balkans Cup, which marked the first international success by any Greek football club. The Balkans Cup was a very popular international competition in the 1960s (the 1967 final attracted 42,000 spectators), being the second most important international club competition for clubs from the Balkans (after the European Champions' Cup). Olympiacos topped his group after some notable wins, beating Galatasaray 1–0 at the Karaiskakis Stadium, with Stelios Psychos scoring the decisive goal in 49th minute of the game, as well as FK Sarajevo (3–2) and FC Brașov (1–0), bagging also two away draws against Galatasaray (1–1) in Mithatpaşa Stadium (Metin Oktay 78' – Aristeidis Papazoglou 6') and FK Sarajevo in Koševo Stadium (3–3).
In the final, they faced Levski Sofia, winning the first match in Piraeus (1–0, Giorgos Sideris 37') and losing the second match in Vasil Levski Stadium with the same score. In the third decisive final in Istanbul (a neutral ground), in front of 25,000 fans who filled Mithatpaşa Stadium, Olympiacos beat Levski 1–0 with a goal by Mimis Stefanakos in the 87th minute and won the Balkans Cup.
First Greek club to advance to the next round of any European competition (1963–64) In 1963, Olympiacos became the first Greek team to advance to the next round of any European competition, eliminating Zagłębie Sosnowiec from Poland for the 1963–64 European Cup Winners' Cup. They won the first match in Piraeus 2–1, lost the second leg in Poland 1–0 and beat Zagłębie 2–0 in the third decisive match. In the next phase, they faced Lyon and despite their 2–1 win in Georgios Karaiskakis Stadium they were eliminated by the strong French side.
Eliminating Riva's Cagliari and Dalglish's Celtic, Palotai denies quarter-finals spot (1972–75) In the 1972–75 Goulandris era, Olympiacos had a solid presence in European competitions, eliminating great clubs, and losing their qualification to the quarter-finals of the 1975 European Cup in a highly controversial game. They managed to eliminate Cagliari in the 1972–73 UEFA Cup, a major force in Italian football during the late 1960s and the early 1970s, (1970 Serie A Champions, 1972 Serie A title contenders), with world-class Italian international players like Gigi Riva, Angelo Domenghini, Enrico Albertosi, Pierluigi Cera, Sergio Gori and Fabrizio Poletti. Olympiacos managed to beat Cagliari twice, 2–1 in Piraeus and 1–0 in Cagliari, becoming the first ever Greek football club to win on Italian soil. In the next round they faced the competition's defending champions Tottenham Hotspur, who were undefeated for 16-straight games in all European competitions. Olympiacos did not manage to qualify against Spurs, but they managed to get a 1–0 win in Piraeus, which ended Tottenham's undefeated streak and marked the first ever victory of a Greek football club against an English side. Two years later, Olympiacos entered the 1974–75 European Cup and they were drawn to face Kenny Dalglish's Celtic, one of the strongest teams in European football at that timeEuropean Champions in 1967, finalists in 1970, semi-finalists in 1972 and semi-finalists of the previous season. The first leg was played in Celtic Park, where Celtic had never been defeated, running an undefeated streak of 36 straight home games in all European competitions (27 wins, 9 draws) from 1962 to 1974. Olympiacos took the lead through Milton Viera's strike in the 36th minute, with Celtic equalising late in the game. The away draw gave Olympiacos the advantage and they finished the job in Piraeus, after a spectacular 2–0 win against the Scottish Champions with Kritikopoulos and Stavropoulos finding the net. In the next round, they were drawn to play against Anderlecht for a place in the quarter-finals of the competition. Anderlecht won the first leg with 5–1 and Olympiacos' task seemed impossible. In the second leg in Greece, however, Olympiacos put on a dominant display and almost reached a winning score in a match that was marked by referee Károly Palotai's decisions. Olympiacos beat Anderlecht 3–0, while Palotai disallowed four Olympiacos goals and did not give at least three clear penalties committed by Anderlecht players, while Stavropoulos was shown a red card for no good reason. The match is widely known in Greece as the "Palotai massacre" with Olympiacos coming close to one of the biggest comebacks in European Cup history.
Eliminating AFC Ajax in European Cup (1983)
In 1983 Olympiacos entered the 1983–84 European Cup and were drawn against the European powerhouse and Dutch champions AFC Ajax of world-class players like Marco van Basten, Ronald Koeman and Frank Rijkaard. The first leg was held in Amsterdam and ended with 0–0 draw, with Olympiacos holding firm and taking the advantage for the second leg.
The second match in Athens was a thriller and a further goalless stalemate, before extra-time when Nikos Anastopoulos scored twice (95', 118') and send Olympiacos through, causing the 80,000 Olympiacos fans in the Olympic Stadium of Athens to burst into frenetic celebrations. In the Last 16 they faced Portuguese club Benfica, but despite their comfortable 1–0 in Athens, where Anastopoulos scored the goal and lost a crucial penalty as well, they were eliminated after a 3–0 defeat in Lisbon.
UEFA Cup Winners' Cup quarter-finalists (1992–93) In 1992 Olympiacos, coached by Oleh Blokhin, entered the 1992–93 European Cup Winners' Cup and after eliminating Chornomorets Odesa in the first round, they were drawn against Arsène Wenger's AS Monaco, a very strong side with players like Jürgen Klinsmann, Youri Djorkaeff, Lilian Thuram and Jean-Luc Ettori. Olympiacos eliminated Monaco and reached the quarter-finals after a hard-fought 1–0 away win in Stade Louis II with a goal by Giorgos Vaitsis in the 86th minute and a goalless draw in Karaiskakis Stadium in the second match. They weren't able to qualify for the semi-finals, as they were eliminated by Atlético Madrid, with 1–1 draw at home and 3–1 loss in Vicente Calderón.