There are 17 sports in Greece. The most popular are football, handball, volleyball, basketball, water polo and athletics. Athletics sports include: running (sprint, medium, long, hurdles, marathons, relays), walking (10 km, 20 km, 50 km), throws (javelin, hammer, discus, shot put), jumping (high, long, pole vault, triple jump) and heptathlon (quadruple, pentathlon, heptathlon, decathlon).
Athletics sports were initially presented at the Olympic Games. They were held every four years, starting from 776 BC to 393 CE. They were celebrated in the summer from the end of July to the beginning of September. In ancient Greece, sport was considered an important element of boys’ education and positive character formation. The Greeks valued sports competition and believed that winning was a sign of divine favor for the player.
Sport for the ancient Greeks also had a religious meaning – the largest competitions were held on the occasion of religious holidays. Each Greek polis had its own calendar of sporting events, where local athletes competed in honor of the gods. Every year there were at least two great Games, and there were also many local events and events organized because of special occasions.The prizes in the Panhellenic Games were symbolic, but they were also high and specific, in objects and coins, as well as in honors and privileges granted by the home city. The great importance of the Olympics led to the emergence of professional sport.
The Greece men’s national football team played its first official interstate match in 1920. In the match of the first round, the Greeks lost 0:9 to the Swedish national team. The next match was played by the Greek national team only in 1929.The hosts then lost to the second team of Italy 1:4. The Greek team was considered a football weakling – in the years 1954-1990 the qualifiers for the next World Cup ended in the last or penultimate place in the group.
The Greeks had to wait fourteen years for another promotion to the big event – in 1994 they made their debut at the World Cup thanks to a successful qualification, in which the Greek national team took first place in the group. At the 2004 European Championships, the Greek team won. In the qualifiers for the 2020 European Championships, the Greeks were placed in Group J with Italy, Finland, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Armenia and Liechtenstein. After playing ten games, they finished third in the group with 14 points and did not advance to the Euro finals.
The Greek Basketball Association – Ελληνική Ομοσπονδία Καλαθοσφαίρισης is responsible for the functioning of the Greek national basketball team. Greece became a member of FIBA in 1932. The A1 Ethniki is the highest professional basketball league in Greece. It is run by the Association of Greek Basketball Clubs and is one of the best leagues in Europe. It consists of 14 teams, and the competition runs from October to June.
Skiing is a young sport in Greece due to the difficult to predict snow conditions and in part because of the short season. The most developed ski resort is located on Parnassus – a legendary mountain near Delphi. Other major ski resorts include Velúchi near Karpeníssion in central Greece, Chelmós near Kalávrity in the Peloponnese and Vérmion in Macedonia. A little lower ski areas lie in the vicinity of Pisodéri near Flórina and near the village of Métsovo in Epirus. The Pílion Mountains are also great for skiing.
