Sotiris Kaiafas
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| Personal information | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Full name | Sotiris Kaiafas | ||
| Date of birth | 17 December 1949 | ||
| Place of birth | Mia Milia, Cyprus | ||
| Height | 1.76 m (5 ft 9 1⁄2 in) | ||
| Playing position | Striker | ||
| Senior career* | |||
| Years | Team | Apps | (Gls) |
| 1967–1984 | Omonia | 388 | (261) |
| National team | |||
| Cyprus | 33 | (19) | |
| * Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only. |
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Sotiris Kaiafas (born 17 December 1949 in Mia Milia, Nicosia) is a retired Cypriot footballer, who played for Omonia and Cyprus. During his career at Omonia, he won the European Golden Boot. He is considered the best footballer that Cyprus has ever produced and also one of the two best Cypriot sportpeople in the 20th century.
Kaiafas played for a local club in Mia Milia, called Proodos. In 1965, he joined Omonia and in 1967, he debuted for Omonia senior team joining the youth team at the age of 16 because he was clearly a class above the rest in his age group. Soon he established himself as one of the most prolific strikers Omonia had ever employed. But it was not until the early 1970s that he served notice of his talent. In the 1971–72 season, Kaiafas became for first time leading scorer in Cyprus with 12 goals, a tally that helped Omonia to their third domestic title. It was the start of a successful partnership.
Kaiafas, like other Cypriot stars such as Andreas Stylianou, Panicos Efthymiades and Leonidas Leonidou, became a cult hero to the fans. It was a period where there was a close connection between players and watchers, at a time when football was played on gravel, not grass, and its practitioners paid only a pittance by clubs.
During the Turkish invasion of Cyprus the Turks captured the northern part of Cyprus along with Kaiafas' village Mia Milia. He, along with 200,000 other Greek Cypriots, had to leave his houses and become a refugee in the rest of Cyprus. Firstly he moved to South Africa with his family for one year after his house fell into the hands of the Turks, but one year later he came back to Cyprus and since then he and his family live in Nicosia. In South Africa, he played football for a year.
He was top scorer of the Cypriot First Division in another seven seasons (1973–74, 1975–76, 1976–77, 1978–79, 1979–80, 1980–81 and 1981–82) and scored a total of nearly 300 league goals, having the record of scoring in a season in Cypriot First Division 44 goals. By all of these achievements, he fired his beloved Omonia AC to the league championship on six occasions.
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