Lazaros Voreadis (born July 18, 1960 in Thessaloniki). is a Greek

basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular Basketball court, court, compete with the primary objective of #Shooting, shooting a basketball (ball), basketball (appro ...

referee A referee is an official, in a variety of sports and competition, responsible for enforcing the rules of the sport, including sportsmanship decisions such as ejection. The official tasked with this job may be known by a variety of other title ...

. Voreadis was born in

Thessaloniki, Greece Thessaloniki (; ), also known as Thessalonica (), Saloniki, Salonika, or Salonica (), is the second-largest city in Greece (with slightly over one million inhabitants in its Thessaloniki metropolitan area, metropolitan area) and the capital cit ...

, and he speaks both Greek and English.

Refereeing career

Residing in

Athens, Greece Athens ( ) is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns in Greece, largest city of Greece. A significant coastal urban area in the Mediterranean, Athens is also the capital of the Attica (region), Attica region and is the southe ...

,Lazaros Voreadis began his career as a basketball referee in 1978 and became an international referee in 1992, officiating at various prominent international events, including the Olympics. The 85 kg professional referee officiated at the 7th World Championship for Junior Men at Thessaloniki in the year 2003. He officiated the finals of the

Saporta Cup The FIBA Saporta Cup, founded as ''FIBA European Cup Winners Cup'', was the name of the second-tier level European-wide professional club basketball competition, where the domestic National Cup winners, from all over Europe, played against eac ...

and the

Korać Cup Korać is a surname. Notable persons with that name include: * Dušan Korać (disambiguation), multiple people * Milorad Korać (born 1969), Serbian football player and manager * Radivoj Korać (1938–1969), Serbian basketball player * Vitomir ...

in 2002, within 15 days of each other. Voreadis officiated at the 2004 Olympic Basketball Tournament and he took the Judge's Oath at the opening ceremony to the Games. He was also a referee at the 2003 European Championship for Men. He stepped down from refereeing in 2010, marking the end of his career in active officiating. During a Olympiakos-Panathinaikos Greek Basketball League game in 2002, he was struck by a projectile thrown by an Olympiakos fan and was comforted by colleague Nikos Papadimitriou.

References

IOC 2004 Summer Olympics
1960 births Greek basketball referees Greek men's basketball players Living people Olympic officials Oath takers at the Olympic Games Basketball players from Thessaloniki 20th-century Greek sportsmen {{Greece-basketball-bio-stub