Athens Football Clubs Association


 * The first version of this article has been based in the text of the Greek Wikipedia published under GFDL.

Athens Football Clubs Association (Ένωση Ποδοσφαιρικών Σωματείων Αθηνών) is one of the oldest amateur Greek association football clubs associations, representing teams from Athens Prefecture.

History
It was officially founded in 1924, but its history begins in 1919 when Greece Football Clubs Association was founded. During the 1923–24 Championship of the E.P.S. Greece, the Athenian teams had many complaints from the referee, which they accused of being biased against them in favor of the club of Piraeus. The climax of the protests was the withdrawal from the championship of three teams of Athens on 30 March 1924, two games before its end and while the title seemed to be decided between O.F. Piraeus and A.P.S. Piraeus, who eventually won the title. The teams that left were Panathinaikos, Apollon Athens and Athinaikos

Almost immediately, these three clubs, together with Atromitos, Panionios and the then-founded Milon Athens, created the "Athens Football Clubs Association" (E.S.P. Athens) and proceeded to hold a separate championship with the participation of five clubs. The founding clubs of the association were:


 * AEK Athens
 * Goudi Athens
 * Atromitos
 * Panathinaikos
 * Panionios
 * Apollon Athens

In the early 2000s, the associations of the former the Prefecture of East Attica were split off, creating the East Attica Football Clubs Association, as well as the counterparts of the former Prefecture of West Attica by founding West Attica Football Clubs Association.

League


From 1924 to 1959 the first division E.P.S. Athens included in its composition the top teams of Athens. Until the 1958–59 season, the first two, three or four teams of the final standings of Athens first division were qualified to the final phase of the Panhellenic Championship, together with the corresponding teams from the E.P.S. of Piraeus and Macedonia and some provincial clubs that qualified through a special tournament called "Regional Championships". Thus, the first division of Athens was the most difficult of any other local association, as the clubs that made it up were clearly stronger than their counterparts. It common for the Athenian teams that reached the final phase of the Panhellenic Championship were mostly exhausted due to great competition and lack of current training infrastructure. Until 1959 the first division of Athens was essentially the most powerful local league in the country, but with the establishment of the national divisions, it lost ground in the football hierarchy.

Organization
The association is a member of the Hellenic Football Federation and organizes a regional football league and cup. It currently represents 900 football players and 131 amateur men's football clubs.

Twenty (20) of these football clubs are playing in national leagues. The six (6) women's football clubs of Athens F.C.A. are playing in the first and second national league. Sixteen (16) football clubs are playing in Hellenic Indoor Football League.

The football clubs are separated in three leagues:


 * Athens F.C.A. A league (32 clubs)
 * Group A (16 clubs)
 * Group B (16 clubs)
 * Athens F.C.A. B league (48 clubs)
 * Group A (16 clubs)
 * Group B (16 clubs)
 * Group C (16 clubs)
 * Athens F.C.A. C league (55 clubs}
 * Group A (11 clubs)
 * Group B (11 clubs)
 * Group C (11 clubs)
 * Group D (12 clubs)
 * Group of B teams (10 clubs)

Finals
Notes

1 The cup was suspended due to the COVID-19 pandemic and thus the outcome of the institution was judjed after a draw.

2 All the institutions of the local association were suspended due to the COVID-19 pandemic.