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Full name | Αθλητικός Ποδοσφαιρικός Όμιλος Ελλήνων Λευκωσίας Athletikos Podosferikos Omilos Ellinon Lefkosias (Athletic Football Club of Greeks of Nicosia) | |||
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Nickname(s) | Τhrylos (The Legend) | |||
Short name | APOEL | |||
Founded | 8 November 1926 | |||
Ground | GSP Stadium | |||
Capacity | 22,859 | |||
Owner | APOEL Football Limited | |||
Chairman | Prodromos Petrides | |||
Manager | David Gallego | |||
League | Cypriot First Division | |||
2023–24 | Cypriot First Division, 1st of 14 (champions) | |||
Website | Club website | |||
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Active departments of APOEL Nicosia | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
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APOEL FC (Greek: ΑΠΟΕΛ; short for Αθλητικός Ποδοσφαιρικός Όμιλος Ελλήνων Λευκωσίας, Athletikos Podosferikos Omilos Ellinon Lefkosias, lit. "Athletic Football Club of Greeks of Nicosia") is a Cypriot professional football club based in Nicosia, Cyprus. APOEL is the most successful football team in Cyprus with an overall tally of 29 national championships, 21 cups, and 13 super cups.[1]
APOEL's greatest moment in European competition occurred in the 2011–12 season, when they advanced out of the group stage of the UEFA Champions League (winning a group that included FC Porto, Shakhtar Donetsk, and Zenit St. Petersburg), then eliminated Olympique Lyonnais in the last 16, to become the first Cypriot team to reach the quarter-finals of the Champions League.[2] APOEL's European competitions highlights also include appearances in the group stages of the 2009–10 and 2014–15 UEFA Champions League and the group stages of the 2013–14, 2015–16, and 2016–17 UEFA Europa League. They marked their most successful UEFA Europa League campaign during the 2016–17 season, when they managed to top their group (along with Olympiacos, Young Boys, and Astana) and eliminated Athletic Bilbao in the round of 32, to reach the last 16 of the competition for the first time in their history.[3][4] APOEL is the only Cypriot club who have reached the group stages (and the knockout stages) of both major UEFA competitions (UEFA Champions League and UEFA Europa League). In the 2016–17 season, APOEL drew an average home league attendance of 7,126 and their highest league attendance was 15,462. Both were the highest in the league.[5]
APOEL FC is part of the APOEL multi-sport club, which was founded in 1926 and maintains departments for several sports including football, basketball, volleyball, futsal, table tennis, bowling, cycling, archery, swimming and water polo. APOEL is one of the founding members of the Cyprus Football Association[6] and also an ordinary member of the European Club Association, an organization that replaced the previous G-14 which consists of major football clubs in Europe.