Kaftanzoglio Stadium - Thessaloniki, Greece.

27 October 1960: Inauguration of the Stadium by the then Prime Minister, Konstantinos Karamanlis.
6 November 1960: The first official football match held in Kaftazoglio was the contest between Iraklis FC and Thermaikos Thermis FC for the Greek Championship of the First League. The match ended with a 2-1 victory for Iraklis FC, while Plastiras Xylas was the first player to score in the brand new stadium.
26 October 1961: The first international match held in the stadium –between Iraklis and the mixed team of Voivontina- which ended with 2-1. In order to cover the needs of European matches broadcasting, spotlights were installed in September 1963, which were first used during the match of Iraklis-Saragossa. Being the most modern stadium of Thessaloniki, Kaftazonglio hosted also the other clubs of the city during their European matches. Aris FC played there against Roma FC (0-0) and against Chelsea (score 1-1, 42,103 fans attending), while PAOK FC won there for the first time in an international match against Wiener with 2-1.
16 October 1966: The first match for the Greek National Football Team in Kaftanzoglio. The Greek team faced the Finnish one during the competition for the Nations Cup Qualification. The match ended with a 2-1 victory for the Greek team.
15 October 1969: A match of the Greek National Team against the Swiss one for the qualification for the 1970 World Cup. This was the first television broadcasting of a football match of the Greek National Team with Giannis Diakogiannis as commentator, a legendary voice of the Greek football fields; the match ended with a 4-1 victory for the Greek team.
24 January 1971: Ticket sales record for a Greek Championship match was registered for the match of Iraklis-Panathinaikos, which ended with a 1-0 victory for Iraklis. 45,634 tickets were sold, a record held for over 10 ten years, which was then beaten by the Olympic Stadium of Kalogreza (OAKA).
16 May 1973: Final match of the European Top Teams Cup between the Italian Milan and the English Leeds United. This was the first final match of European organisation assigned to Greece, since Kaftanzoglio fulfilled all the operational and safety conditions required. The match ended with 1-0 and Milan took the European Cup.
28 June 1991: Begin of the 11th Mediterranean Games. In Thessaloniki the Games were hosted in the Kaftanzoglio Stadium and the Palais des Sports. Altogether there were 3,500 athletes contesting in 23 sports.
14 December 1999: Friendly match of the Greek National Football Team against the National Team of Ghana. The match was held in order to honour one of the most important figures in Greek football, Vasilis Chantzipanagis, who -although he had left the fields for many years- played in the first XI. Vasilis Chantzipanagis, known also as “Noureyev of the fields”, named after the famous Russian dancer, had excited in his past career as a player of Iraklis the Kaftazonglio and the public dozens of times with his dancing dribbles and master executions.
11 August 2004: The Olympic Games. The first sport contest of the Olympic Games Athens 2004 was held in Kaftanzoglio Stadium, where 12 football matches of the qualification, pre semi-finals and semi-finals were hosted as well as the match for the third place of men.

The first football match of the Olympic Games, between the Olympic Teams of Greece and South Korea, was held on the 11th of August 2004, 2 days before the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games. The match took place in the crowded Kaftanzoglio, within the framework of the first Group of the Olympic Tournament and ended with a 2-2 tie.

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