Career
He successfully competed for AEL, Olympiacos and the Greek national football team He is considered to be one of the best number 10 shirt of all times in Greece and the last before another great player, Vassilis Tsiartas. Born in Ambelokipoi, Larissa, Karapialis began to play football in Larissa"s grounds.
School wasn"t so important for him.
At the age of 14, in 1979, he began his early career at Toxotis Larissa youth team Toxotis had another talent too, Giorgos Agorogiannis, later Karapialis"s teammate at AEL and one of the best Larissa"s players of all times too.
Due to his notable skills, Karapialis moved to Toxotis first team a year later, in 1980. He made some excellent appearances with Toxotis at Larissa Prefecture Amateur League and aroused Alpha Ethniki teams interest.
In 1984, OFI Crete was paying Toxotis 2,1 million Greek Drahmas (almost 6200 Euro"s) for him, but Karapialis did not want to leave his hometown and he refused the transfer.
His greatest dream was to play for Larissa"s "queen", AEL. After an outstanding 1984-1985 season with Toxotis, when he scored 30 goals playing as a Midfielder, the time had come for the dream to come true. Soon he had his own fan club watching him playing every single week, holding a "Karapialis, You Are Magic" banner.
Foreign the first two seasons Karapialis wwas usually used as a substitute. The next seasons were bad for AEL, as the club faced serious bankruptcy problems.
Three seasons after the Championship, Karapialis left his favourite AEL for the most successful Greek football club, Olympiacos.
In 1991"s summer, Karapialis signed for Olympiacos and the fans celebrated. Karapialis quickly became the leader of the Red-Whites due to his aggression, agility, great technique and, of course, experience. Karapialis appeared in 21 matches for the senior Greece national football team from 1988 to 1994.
Although Karapialis was a phenomenal talent, he played only 21 games with the Greek national football team, scoring 2 goals.
He was not a regular choice for the team while he was playing for AEL 1964, because coaches used to call players only from Olympiacos, AEK Athens, Panathinaikos and PAOK, as they are Athens and Thessaloniki based. Every countryside team, like AEL 1964, was not happy with that, because they had great players, like Karapialis, wasted only because they were playing in countryside teams.
He felt insulted and announced his retirement from the National team In May 2000, Karapialis announced his retirement from professional football.
The same year, he was voted as the third best Greek professional football player (after 1979, when football became professional in Greece), after Vassilis Hatzipanagis and Dimitris Saravakos.
He is considered to be the best Greek number 10 shirt in history of Olympiacos along with Georgios Delikaris. 5 Greek football Championships: 1988, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000.
