AEK Larnaca FC
Also written as AEK Larnaca.
The club
AEK Larnaca is the Cypriot club, based in the city of Larnaca on the island's south-east coast. It is not to be confused with AEK Athens, the Greek club of the same initials that plays in Athens, nor with any other AEK; the two are entirely separate organisations with separate histories, and AEK Athens does not otherwise feature in this dossier.
The club was founded on 18 July 1994 as Athletic Union Kition of Larnaca, formed by the merger of two older Larnaca clubs, EPA Larnaca and Pezoporikos. In June 2025 AEK Larnaca's request to have the honours of both founding clubs formally recognised in its own name was approved, so the five league titles and nine Cypriot Cups now credited to AEK Larnaca were in fact won by EPA Larnaca and Pezoporikos before the 1994 merger; the club has not won the Cypriot championship under its own name.
Home matches are played at the AEK Arena – Georgios Karapatakis, which opened in October 2016 and holds 8,058. Before that the club used the New GSZ Stadium, and before that the old GSZ Stadium, which dated back to 1928.
The head coach is the Spaniard Iñaki Astiz, in caretaker charge since 14 August 2026. He took over from Mauro Camoranesi, the Argentina-born Italy World Cup winner, whose own spell in charge ran from 17 June 2026 to 14 August 2026, a little under two months.
Recent seasons
AEK Larnaca finished second in 2021/22 with 54 points from 14 wins, 12 draws and 6 losses, 44 goals for and 29 against, behind champions Apollon Limassol on 58. In 2022/23 they were third on 66 points, 20 wins, 6 draws and 10 losses, 55 scored and 37 conceded, as Aris Limassol won their first-ever title with 74. In 2023/24 AEK finished level on 73 points with APOEL, 21 wins, 10 draws and 5 losses, 57 scored and 31 conceded, but lost the championship on head-to-head record, APOEL holding an 8-2 advantage in matches between the two. In 2024/25 AEK were fourth on 68 points, 19 wins, 11 draws and 6 losses, 58 scored and 30 conceded, as Pafos won their first-ever title. In 2025/26 AEK were runners-up again, 69 points from 20 wins, 9 draws and 7 losses, 62 scored and 33 conceded, 18 points behind champions Omonia, who took their 22nd title.
Honours and landmarks
AEK Larnaca are credited with five Cypriot First Division titles, in 1944–45, 1945–46, 1953–54, 1969–70 and 1987–88, and nine Cypriot Cups, in 1944–45, 1945–46, 1949–50, 1952–53, 1954–55, 1969–70, 2003–04, 2017–18 and 2024–25; as noted above, everything before 1994 was won by predecessor clubs EPA Larnaca and Pezoporikos and only formally credited to AEK Larnaca from June 2025. The club has also won the Cypriot Super Cup three times, in 1955, 2018 and 2025, and the Cypriot Second Division once, in 1989–90, evidence of an early spell outside the top flight.
The clearest European landmark is 2011/12, when AEK Larnaca became the first Cypriot club to reach the Europa League group stage.
Notable scorelines
The club's biggest recorded European win is a 9-0 aggregate defeat of Floriana of Malta in 2011/12 Europa League qualifying, an 8-0 away leg described in the sources read here as the largest away winning margin recorded by a Cypriot club in European competition. At the other end, AEK lost 2-0 on aggregate to Barcelona in the first round of the 1996/97 UEFA Cup Winners' Cup, Barcelona going on to win the competition that season. More recently, AEK were eliminated 0-5 on aggregate by Paks of Hungary in the 2024/25 Conference League second qualifying round, and lost 6-1 on aggregate to Brann of Norway in the 2025/26 Europa League play-off round, including a 4-0 home defeat in the second leg.
European record
AEK Larnaca's best European run remains 2011/12: after eliminating Floriana 9-0 on aggregate they beat Mladá Boleslav 5-2 and Rosenborg 2-1 on aggregate to reach the Europa League group stage, taking five points from one win, two draws and three defeats.
In 2022/23 AEK beat Partizan of Serbia 4-3 on aggregate and Dnipro-1 of Ukraine 5-1 to reach the Europa League group stage, where they finished third, before being eliminated from the resulting Conference League knockout round by West Ham United 6-0 on aggregate. In 2024/25 they went out at the second qualifying round stage, beaten 0-5 on aggregate by Paks.
2025/26 was AEK's longest run since 2011/12. They beat Partizan again in the Europa League first qualifying round, 2-2 on aggregate after a 1-0 home win and a 2-1 extra-time defeat in Belgrade, going through 6-5 on penalties. In the second qualifying round they beat Celje 3-2 on aggregate, drawing 1-1 away at the Stadion Z'dežele on 24 July 2025 and winning 2-1 at home on 31 July. The third qualifying round brought a 5-3 aggregate win over Legia Warsaw, 4-1 at home on 7 August 2025 and 1-2 away at the Polish Army Stadium on 14 August. The play-off round ended the Europa League campaign: AEK lost 2-1 away to Brann in Bergen on 21 August 2025 and then 0-4 at home on 28 August, going out 6-1 on aggregate. Dropping into the Conference League league phase, AEK were unbeaten, three wins and three draws from six matches, conceding only once and scoring seven, finishing 8th of 36 and advancing directly, as a seeded team, to the round of 16. There they were eliminated by Crystal Palace, held 0-0 away at Selhurst Park on 12 March 2026 before losing 1-2 after extra time at home on 19 March, out 2-1 on aggregate.
Head-to-head notes
The only meeting between AEK Larnaca and Celje in this corpus is the 2025/26 Europa League second qualifying round tie described above, which AEK won 3-2 on aggregate. No other head-to-head pattern against clubs relevant to this corpus was established from the sources read here.
Quotes
No directly quoted material was confirmed from the sources read here.
Right now (2026/27)
Iñaki Astiz remains caretaker head coach, having taken charge on 14 August 2026 after Mauro Camoranesi's brief spell ended. AEK Larnaca enter the 2026/27 UEFA Conference League qualifying rounds as a seeded club in the second qualifying round, with a UEFA club coefficient of 20.250; the opponent and any result were not confirmed from the sources read here.
Domestically, the 2026/27 Cypriot First Division was scheduled to open on the weekend of 29-30 August 2026 and had not yet kicked off as of the sources read here, so AEK Larnaca's league form for the new season was not established.
Sources
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AEK_Larnaca_FC https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2021%E2%80%9322_Cypriot_First_Division https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2022%E2%80%9323_Cypriot_First_Division https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2023%E2%80%9324_Cypriot_First_Division https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024%E2%80%9325_Cypriot_First_Division https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2025%E2%80%9326_Cypriot_First_Division https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026%E2%80%9327_Cypriot_First_Division https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2025%E2%80%9326_UEFA_Europa_League_qualifying_phase_and_play-off_round https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2025%E2%80%9326_UEFA_Conference_League https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2025%E2%80%9326_UEFA_Conference_League_league_phase https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2025%E2%80%9326_UEFA_Conference_League_knockout_phase https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026%E2%80%9327_UEFA_Conference_League_qualifying
Researched and written for not4quarters. Where a fact could not be established from the sources read, this page says so rather than guessing.