Panathinaikos V.C. (), also known simply as Panathinaikos, or with its full name Panathinaikos A.O. (, transliterated "Panathinaikos Athlitikos Omilos", ''Panathenaic Athletic Club'') is the professional

volleyball Volleyball is a team sport in which two teams of six players are separated by a net. Each team tries to score points by grounding a ball on the other team's court under organized rules. It has been a part of the official program of the Summ ...

team of the major

Athens 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 ...

based multi- sport club Panathinaikos A.O. Founded in 1919, it is one of the oldest and most successful volleyball clubs in

Greece Greece, officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. Located on the southern tip of the Balkan peninsula, it shares land borders with Albania to the northwest, North Macedonia and Bulgaria to the north, and Turkey to th ...

. They have won 21 Greek Championships finishing 6 times undefeated (1962–63, 1965–66, 1966–67, 1969–70, 1970–71, 1974–75), 6 Greek Cups, 3 Greek League Cups and 2 Greek Super Cups. They have reached also twice the

CEV Cup The CEV Cup is the second tier official competition for men's Volleyball clubs of Europe. The competition takes place every year. Until 2000, it was the CEV Cup Winners' Cup. In 2000 it was renamed to CEV Top Teams Cup and in 2007 to CEV Cup. T ...

final (1979–80, 2008–09). Notable Greek player have played for the team, while foreign world-class players that have played with the club include Dante Amaral, Marcelo Elgarten, André Nascimento, Frank Depestele, Liberman Agamez, Peter Pláteník, Jakub Novotný, Plamen Konstantinov, Boyan Yordanov, Björn Andrae,

Andrija Gerić Andrija Gerić ( sr-cyrl, Андрија Герић, ; born 24 January 1977) is a retired Serbian volleyball player who played on middle blocker position. Both in the club and in the national team he wore number 12. Career Gerić made a debut f ...

Clayton Stanley Clayton Iona "Clay" Stanley (born January 20, 1978) is an American former volleyball player, who was a member of United States men's national volleyball team, a participant of the Olympic Games ( Athens 2004, Beijing 2008, London 2012), Oly ...

, Ernardo Gómez, Renaud Herpe, Guillaume Samica, Dawid Murek, Paweł Zagumny and Łukasz Żygadło.

History

The volleyball department of Panathinaikos was founded in 1919 and is one of the first in

. With the participation of Giorgos Kalafatis in the

Inter-Allied Games The Inter-Allied Games was a one-off multi-sport event held from 22 June to 6 July 1919 at the newly constructed Pershing Stadium just outside Paris, France following the end of World War I. The host stadium had been built near the Bois de Vi ...

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

in 1919, and the informations he collected, the sport became more known in

. The same year the officials of the club decided the creation of a volleyball team. The first dynamic presence of the team is dated back in the years 1927–29 with many popular players of the time such as the founder Giorgos Kalafatis, the historical member of the board Apostolos Nikolaidis, as well as players such as Athanasios Aravositas, Goumas, Arg. Nikolaidis, Papageorgiou and Papastefanou. In the following years the interest for volleyball became less until before

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

when Panathinaikos presented a powerful team with leader players such as Lambrou, Vallidis, Momferatos, Tzoumanis, Proselentis, Lykouris, Kakridis and more. During the 60’s and 70’s, Panathinaikos' volleyball club won many titles and honors due to the fact that the team roster has always included some of the leading volleyball players and coaches in Greece. The first and most popular generation of players of 60’s was Andreas and Nikos Bergeles, as well as Iliopoulos, Leloudas, Chasapis, Emmanouil, Perros and Fotiou who opened the road for the next generations. Notable coaches of this era was the leading figure of the department Gerasimos Theodoratos, the

Yugoslavia , common_name = Yugoslavia , life_span = 1918–19921941–1945: World War II in Yugoslavia#Axis invasion and dismemberment of Yugoslavia, Axis occupation , p1 = Kingdom of SerbiaSerbia , flag_p ...

n Sava Grozdanović and later the ex-player of the team Andreas Bergeles. The most important achievement of the team was the participation in the final of the European Cup in 1980 with Grozdanović as coach and players such as Georgantis, Agrapidakis, Iliopoulos, Papadopoulos, Malousaris, Gountakos, Astras, Kokkinaras and Koliopoulos. In the following years, Panathinaikos team continued to dominate the Greek championship with Janusz Badora as coach and players such as Kazazis, Tentzeris, Gontikas, Galakos, Dimitriadis, Margaronis, Karamaroudis and Andreopoulos. Two of the most successful periods have been 1994-95 and 1995-96 seasons, when Panathinaikos won 2 consecutive championships with Stelios Prosalikas as head coach and Andreopoulos, Triantafillidis, Filippov, Spanos, Hatziantoniou, Ouzounov, A. Kovacev, S. Kovacev, Karamaroudis, Mavrakis, Konstantinidis, Zakynthinos, Koutouleas, Tonev as players. In 2001 the department became professional under the presidency and financial support of Vlassis Stathokostopoulos and later Thanasis Giannakopoulos. In 2004 the team won the Championship with the ex-player Stelios Kazazis as coach. With the

Brazil Brazil, officially the Federative Republic of Brazil, is the largest country in South America. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by area, fifth-largest country by area and the List of countries and dependencies by population ...

ian star-player Dante Amaral and Marcelo Elgarten, they made a strong team and finished again first in 2006, while they reached again the final of the European Cup in 2009.

Honours

Domestic

Greek Championship The Super League Greece 1 (), or Stoiximan Super League for sponsorship reasons, is a professional association football league in Greece and the highest level of the Greek football league system. The league was formed on 16 July 2006 and repl ...

: (21) ** 1963, 1965, 1966, 1967, 1970, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1982, 1984, 1985, 1986, 1995, 1996, 2004, 2006, 2020, 2022, 2025 *

Greek Cup The Greek Football Cup (), commonly known as the Greek Cup or Betsson Greek Cup for sponsorship reasons is a Greek football competition, run by the Hellenic Football Federation. The Greek Cup is the second-most important domestic men's footba ...

: (6) ** 1982, 1984, 1985, 2007, 2008, 2010 * Greek League Cup: (4) ** 2020, 2022, 2023, 2024 * Greek Super Cup: (2) ** 2006, 2022

European

** ''Runners-up (2):'' 1980, 2009

Current men's volleyball squad

''Team roster – season 2025/2026''

Technical and managerial staff

Retired numbers

Selected former players

File:Plamen konstantinov (cropped).jpg, Plamen Konstantinov File:Nikos Samaras.JPG, Nikos Samaras File:Bjoern Andrae.jpg, Bjoern Andrae File:Andrija Gerić.jpg,

File:Paweł Zagumny 2005-2006 1.jpg, Paweł Zagumny File:Renaud Herpe.jpg, Renaud Herpe File:Gianluca Saraceni.jpg, Gianluca Saraceni ;Albania * Albano Qualiu * Alvi Shurdhi ;Argentina * José Luis González ;Belgium * Frank Depestele * Bram Van Den Dries ;Bosnia-Herzegovina * Milorad Kovać ;Brazil * Dante Amaral * Eduardo Arruda * Hugo de Leon Bozo * Marcelo Elgarten * Windson Ferreira * Roberto Minuzzi * Carlos Alexandre Moreira * Andre Nascimento * Marcelo Mendes Sacchi * Cleber De Oliveira * Lucas Victor Rangel * Vinicius Raguzzoni ;Bulgaria * Theodoros Baev * Plamen Konstantinov * Petar Ouzounov * Dimo Tonev * Aleksandar Simeonov * Boyan Yordanov * Ivan Kovlev * Antonis Kovachev ;Canada * Keith Sanheim * Michael Amoroso * Derrick Epp * Cameron Kern * Maxwell Elgert ;Colombia * Liberman Agamez ;Croatia * Danijel Galić ;Cuba * Osniel Melgarejo * Fernando Hernández * Raydel Hierrezuelo ;Cyprus * Thanasis Protopsaltis ;Czech Republic * Jakub Novotný * Petr Pešl * Peter Pláteník * Dalibor Polak * Petr Zapletal ;Denmark * Axel Jacobsen * Rasmus Breuning Nielsen ;Egypt * Ionas Rezk ;France * Fabrice Bry * Ludovic Castard * Renaud Herpe * Guillaume Samica ;Germany * Björn Andrae ;Greece * Roulis Agrapidakis * Asimakis Alexiou * Andreas Andreadis * Charalampos Andreopoulos * Dimitris Andreopoulos * Andreas Bergeles * Nikos Bergeles * Theodoros Chatziantoniou * Kostas Christofidelis * Dimitris Gontikas * Christos Dimitrakopoulos * Stathis Donas * Pavlos Karamaroudis * Nikos Karatzas * Stelios Kazazis * Michalis Koliopoulos * Antonis Kovatsev * Savvas Kovatsev * Giannis Laios * Giannis Lambrou * Ilias Lappas * Christos Papadopoulos * Sotirios Pantaleon * Panagiotis Pelekoudas * Giorgos Petreas * Spiros Protopsaltis * Thanasis Psarras * Alexandros Raptis * Nikos Samaras * Giorgos Spanos * Georgios Stefanou * Nikolaos Smaragdis * Akis Sidiropoulos * Gerasimos Theodoratos * Michalis Triantafyllidis * Giorgos Zakynthinos * Dimitris Zisis ;Italy * Gianluca Saraceni * Jiří Kovář ;Montenegro * Vojin Ćaćić ;Netherlands * Jairo Hooi * Maarten van Garderen ;Norway * Jonas Kvalen ;Poland * Tomasz Józefacki * Michał Kamiński * Dawid Murek * Paweł Zagumny * Łukasz Żygadło ;Russia * Sergey Orlenko * Gennady Cheremisov ;Serbia *

* Saša Starović * Miloš Stojković * Željko Tanasković ;Slovenia * Sašo Štalekar ;Spain * Jordi Gens ;Ukraine * Yuri Filippov ;United States * Brian Cook * Jared Moore * Jeff Nygaard * Brenden Sander *

* Nick Vogel * Patrick Gasman ;Venezuela * Hernando Gomez

Selected former coaches

* Gerasimos Theodoratos * Sava Grozdanović * Andreas Bergeles * Nikos Bergeles * Aurel Constantinescu * Janusz Badora * Stelios Prosalikas * Carlos Xavier Weber * Francisco dos Santos * Mauro Berruto * Alekos Leonis * Stelios Kazazis

International record

Historical performance in the league

Sponsorships

* Official Sport Clothing Manufacturer:

Adidas Adidas AG (; stylized in all lowercase since 1949) is a German athletic apparel and footwear corporation headquartered in Herzogenaurach, Bavaria, Germany. It is the largest sportswear manufacturer in Europe, and the second largest in the ...

* Great Shirt Sponsor:

OPAP OPAP – Greek Organisation of Football Prognostics S.A. () is a Greek company organizing and conducting games of chance. It is headquartered in Athens and for many years OPAP was a state-owned gambling monopoly. The company holds the exclusive ...

/ Pame Stoixima * Official Sponsors: Viva Fresh, Batteries.gr, Hygeia Medical Center, Avance Car Rental, Biosteel, CIEL, Civitel, Myo Cel, Boukia kai syhorio, Bolossis, Art & Fantasy * Official Broadcaster: ERT

Historical uniforms

Arenas

Presidents

* 2001–08: Vlassis Stathokostopoulos * 2008–09: Thanasis Giannakopoulos * 2009–11: Thodoris Liakopoulos * 2011: Stratos Sopilis * 2011–13: Chronis Akritidis * 2013–16: Manolis Ladoukakis * 2016–18: Dimitris Kassaris * 2018–20: Alexandros Ellinas * 2020– : Panagiotis Malakates

References

External links

Official website
{{A1 Greek volleyball Panathinaikos A.O. Panathinaikos V.C. Volleyball clubs in Greece Volleyball clubs established in 1919 Sports clubs and teams in Athens