For the club’s 100th anniversary, I want to be right where I am now and PAOK at the top. A huge effort and the right moves are required in order to create a team with a future. With our fans’ support, PAOK can reach the top and become one of the biggest clubs in Europe.

Mr Savvidis’s presence guarantees financial stability for the club, as well as the foundations to build a team that will play good football, prevail over every opponent and bring the fans back to the stadium. The fans will be treated to attractive football, success and will enjoy PAOK always as winner.

It’s not easy for players to develop a sentimental bond with the team because they change all the time and the necessary chemistry can’t be acquired. In my playing days, we were bound by contract to stay at a club for eight years. It so happened that many quality players coincided in the team and made a very strong side. But we were also very tight-knit. We were like brothers.

We were tougher back then. Footballers nowadays lack this quality, perhaps because they are treated to every comfort. They have many experts working around them and for them, state-of-the-art installations and excellent pitches. We had to predict how many bounces the ball would make on the grass. If I were still a player, I would have been able to compete even barefooted. I envy them. I entered the dressing rooms in Toumba Stadium and felt envy. Back then we had just three shirts for the whole season. Tsarpanas, may he rest in peace, would safe-keep one of them, just in case we might need it.

Being without silverware for a long time creates pressure. That was the rule back in the day as well. Several times we were forced to leave by the gates of the stadium. Not because we lost! Even winning by just one goal was enough to be chased after.

I will never forget the words of Gyula Lóránt, when the fans had reacted against us. Seeing us all sad and disappointed in the dressing room, he told us: ‘You should be sad when they ignore you. The fact that they fuss about you means you are worthy and that they expect a lot of you’.

Signing for PAOK at the age of 17 was my top moment at the club. Before the deal went through, Mimis Papaioannou had watched me play for Anagennisi Epanomi and asked me if I wanted to move to AEK Athens. However PAOK had already laid the ground for my transfer. I had undergone surgery at the age of 14 and they took care of all expenses. They had been scouting me for a long time. My transfer was rather eventful of course. After some very special negotiations between Epanomi and PAOK and the sum of 100.000 drachmas hidden in baskets with grapes (!), this saga had a happy ending.

I wouldn’t change anything in my career. In 1976, after winning the league title, AEK Athens offered me 5 million drachmas to join them. I went to Pantelakis straight away and told him I didn’t want to leave, asking him not to be unfair to me money-wise. He then opened a safe, took out a million drachmas and told me: ‘That’s all I have. Perhaps I can find a few thousand more’. I decided to stay and I was proven right. I have been in the club for 40 years.

I can’t imagine myself away from PAOK. I have done everything for this team. Cut the grass, carry things, being caretaker… I feel I am a part of this club since my childhood.

I had spoken to Lóránt to continue at PAOK as sweeper, because of my age. His death affected me a lot, however, and I didn’t want to continue playing. I retired from football at the age of 31. Voulinos’s Makedonikos were giving me 3 million drachmas in order to sign for them, but I didn’t want to fool them.

The crest with the double-headed eagle is like a cross. We wear it and remain focused on it. We become one with it. Wearing the PAOK shirt means carrying all the principles of this club.

I became a regular right away. I featured alongside players like Leandros. I became an international at the age of 22 and would share the same pitch with legendary players like Domazos and Papaioannou. All of them were in their 30s and I was almost ten years younger. In a friendly encounter in Australia, I even wore the captain’s armband, becoming their youngest ever skipper. There are so many moments I will never forget.

Our achievements will never be forgotten, but we all want them to be outshined. I am the first to wish it from the bottom of my heart. It would give me enormous pleasure if someone were to beat my scoring record. I wish that such a player will grace Toumba.

I never featured as central forward, but I am the club’s top scorer, mainly because of my positioning. I knew how to move on the pitch and be in the right place at the right time. Having upfront the magnificent trio of Paridis, Aslanidis and Koudas of course facilitated things for me.

• Stavros Sarafis’s interview was published in the 4th issue of Toumba Magazine. You can purchase all six issues of Toumba Magazine from store.paokfc.gr by clicking here, and receive it at home, with no shipping cost in Greece.