Ergotelis

Early years

Ergotelis was established as an amateur club of Cretan footballers in 1929 by prominent Heraklion citizens, mainly refugees from Asia Minor. The club's foundation, as well as its first ever recorded game, a friendly 4–0 win against local side Leon (Greek: Λέων) held at Chandax (Greek: Χάνδαξ) stadium on 4 August 1929, was reported onto local newspaper 'Eleythera Skepsis' (Greek: Ελευθέρα Σκέψις) on Wednesday, 7 August 1929. Since its early days, Ergotelis showed the progressive ideals of its founders, being one of the first sports clubs in Greece to allow women into its sporting divisions, as well as its board of directors. The club temporarily shut down in 1935, following the involvement of its leading executives in political movements of the time. Ergotelis was re-established in 1937, developing a remarkable athletics department along with a strong football team, that went on to place 1st in the 1940 Heraklion Football Clubs Association Championship, which was never finished due to World War II.

After the war, the club emerged as the most powerful competitor to regular Heraklion Football Clubs Association champions OFI, shaping up a new football and social rivalry in local sport. Ergotelis eventually gained its own football ground in 1946, the Ergotelis Stadium (also known as Martinengo Stadium, after the Martinengo Bastion), located on the Venetian Era walls surrounding the city's center, and would mostly play in Heraklion's local championship and Greece's national Second Division, after the latter was founded in the early 1960s. Ergotelis actually came close to achieve a historic promotion to the First Division during the very first Beta Ethniki season held in 1960, finishing 3rd in the Southern Group, just 4 points behind Group Champions Atromitos Piraeus. The club was demoted to the newly established Gamma Ethniki in 1964−65 after finishing 9th in Group 2, and subsequently won the Group 1 Gamma Ethniki championship in 1966, the club's first ever national honour, to top off instant re-promotion to the Beta Ethniki.

Junta years, Theodorakis concert and repercussions (1966–1974)

During the Greek military junta of 1967–1974, Ergotelis was 'branded' as an unpatriotic organization, and its officials were accused for «deviating from the purposes for which they were elected, turning the club into an instrument servicing political, and sometimes unpatriotic objectives», after the club's board of directors allowed renowned songwriter and composer Mikis Theodorakis, a key voice against the right-wing government, to perform a concert on Martinengo stadium. After the conclusion of the 1966–1967 Beta Ethniki season, the club was forcibly relegated to amateur status through a legislation, that allowed each regional city of Greece to be represented in the country's Second national Division by a single team only. Furthermore, to add insult to injury, any local clubs remaining in the Beta Ethniki had the right to demand the transfer of any number of players from the relegated clubs, bypassing official transfer regulations. As a result, five of Ergotelis' best considered players at the time (Konstantinos Theodorakis, Dimitrios Papadopoulos, Manolis Stavroulakis, Konstantinos Zouraris and Georgios Skandalakis), were signed by local rival OFI – who remained in the national competitions. Shortly after, a court decision in favor of Ergotelis was overruled by the junta-controlled Hellenic Football Federation, which finally approved OFI's contracts with the players and threatened Ergotelis officials with eviction from their home turf in Martinengo Stadium. After members of the club's board of directors were either demoted or prosecuted, Ergotelis was practically dismantled in 1967. The club made a brief comeback to the Second Division after winning the 1969−70 local Heraklion Championship, but the weakened roster and administration were too inexperienced to be competitive, and the club was therefore instantly relegated at the end of the 1970−71 season, after finishing in last place.

Post-Junta period and the 80s sporadic breakthroughs (1974–1999)

After the junta's collapse in 1974, several attempts were made to bring the team back to Greek football reality, however most of these were met with failure. As a result, Ergotelis struggled between the lower regional and national competitions for over 30 years. Ergotelis managed not to go completely unnoticed during these years however, achieving some notable breakthroughs in the 80s, along the way to a rebirth.

During the 1982–83 season, the club won the Greek Football Amateur Cup, by defeating AO Arta 2–0 in the competition final held at the Leoforos Alexandras Stadium, thus becoming the first Cretan club to win the competition. The 1984–85 season saw the club finishing at the top of the Delta Ethniki Group 1 table to promote to the Gamma Ethniki as champions. However the most notable feat of this period came during the 1985–86 season, when Ergotelis, at the time playing in the Gamma Ethniki, managed to reach the Greek Cup quarterfinals, which would remain the best performance of the club in the competition for 33 years. Being the sole representative of the Gamma Ethniki still remaining in the competition, Ergotelis consecutively eliminated Niki Volos, Alpha Ethniki side Panserraikos and Olympiacos Volos to reach the quarterfinals, where the club squared off against eventual title winners Panathinaikos. Though giving the "Greens" a tough match to eventually go down 2–3 in the first leg held at the Theodoros Vardinogiannis Stadium in Heraklion, Ergotelis were completely dominated in the second leg, where they lost to the eventual Greek champions with an emphatic 7–1 score at the Leoforos Alexandras Stadium on 9 April 1986. This feat marked the end of Ergotelis' attempts at a return during this period, as the club was relegated back to the Delta Ethniki two years later, at the end of the 1987–88 season.

Ergotelis briefly resurfaced in the mid-90s, spending two consecutive seasons in the Gamma Ethniki during 1996–98, after winning the Delta Ethniki 1995–96 Group 2 championship. It would then take another 5 years for the club to re-emerge, and this time complete a full comeback.