Tribute: Lefteris Eleftheriou- The veteran footballer who made history!

A versatile and talented footballer was Lefteris Eleftheriou who stood out playing for 10 years in AEK Larnaca and then went through Enosis, Achna and Alki. Eleftheriou was until recently the top scorer in AEK's history having scored 71 goals.

Lefteris was a technical footballer, very good in the organizational field and had a strong shot, scoring many important goals even though he was not a pure striker. He started football at Onisillos Sotiras (where he lived) where he played until 1995 playing for 7 years in the Second Division.
Eleftheriou's talent became known and many teams targeted him. It will eventually end up in AEK Larnaca, one year after its unification. From 1995 he played until 2005 and in this decade he celebrated a cup.

He won the trophy in 2004 when he beat AEL 2-1 in the final under coach Andreas Mouskallis and with him were Kythreotis, P. Elias, Sophocleous, P. Christou, Dimosthenous, Aristocleous, Papaioannou, Stylianides, K. Minas, Pavlou, Mousic etc.

In 1996 AEK was a finalist losing in the final to APOEL 2-0 and it was L. Eleftheriou's first year in the team where among others played A. Mavris, A. Misos, Stefani, P. Markou, G. Constantinou, G. Theodotou, Kl. Alexandrou, Bakaris, Kovetsevich, Pangio.

Lefteris made his own history at AEK where he may have been a midfielder, but usually also the team's top scorer.
At the age of 31 he leaves AEK and plays for three years in the Union (2005-08), one in Ethnikos Achna (2008-09) and two in Alki (2009-11) and leaves the stadiums at the age of 36. He is also a 21-time international with the Cyprus national team.