Football in Ukraine

Football is the most popular sport in Ukraine. The Ukrainian Association of Football is the national governing body and is responsible for overseeing all aspects of the game of football in the country. It was organized in 1991 to replace the Soviet Football Federation of Ukrainian SSR, created earlier in the 1920s as part of the Soviet system of physical culture councils. The Ukrainian Association of Football is a non-governmental organization and is a member of the National Olympic Committee of Ukraine.

There are several types of football: professional male and female football, amateur male and female football, youth leagues and children's competitions (younger than age of 13), football veterans and beach football, indoor competition and separate competitions for students and military personnel. Ukraine fields a great number of different national teams for various types of international competitions including continental and world qualifications, Universiades, youth competitions, and international competitions for beach and indoor football.

Summary

The Ukraine national senior team has qualified for the FIFA World Cup once, in 2006, where they reached the quarter-finals led by the former Soviet football star player Oleh Blokhin. The team also qualified on couple of occasions to the continental championship in 2012 and 2016. The Ukraine first junior team made it to the final of the 2006 UEFA European Under-21 Championship. The Ukraine second junior team won the 2009 UEFA European Under-19 Championship and made it to the finals of the FIFA U-20 World Cup. The Ukraine student team won two football tournaments at the Summer Universiade and made it to the finals of another one.

Dynamo Kyiv and Shakhtar Donetsk are among the most recognizable clubs that are from Ukraine. Dynamo Kyiv traces its fame from the Soviet times as they won the European Cup Winners' Cup twice in 1975 and 1986. In 1975 Dynamo extended its success into the UEFA Super Cup as well. In 2009 Shakhtar Donetsk won the UEFA Cup. Among the famous players to come out of Ukraine were Oleh Blokhin and Andriy Shevchenko. The legendary coach Valeri Lobanovski led Dynamo Kyiv to their European Cup victories as well as coaching the former Soviet and later on the Ukraine national football team: He is a Ukrainian football hero.

Ukrainian football professional club competitions are organized in the three-tier league system. Parallel with them there is a knockout competition the Ukrainian Cup. There is also a Super Cup match up that is being conducted on annual basis among the top two best clubs in the country. Several amateur level tournaments are played nationally as well as in every region (oblast); for more information, please see Ukrainian football league system. Female football is less developed, however there is a female national team and a two-tier league system competition for clubs. Among the most successful clubs are ''Lehenda Chernihiv'' and ''Zhytlobud Kharkiv''.

Ukraine has also highly developed children's and youth football. There is a national competition conducted by the professional clubs of Ukraine and the best national sports schools. It is a two-tier league with several regional divisions. Each club is represented by four squads with players in age groups ranging from under 14 to under 17. Parallel to that there is an independent Student League which encompasses teams of various universities and institutions of higher education. Selected players from that league successfully compete at student Olympics, the Universiada. The regional amateur football competitions also provide training opportunities for the young soccer stars.

History

Modern Ukrainian club competitions derived mostly from the Soviet competitions.

Divided at Zbruch, the first football competitions in Ukraine appeared in 1900–1910s including the portion of Ukraine that was part of the Russian Empire as well as Austria-Hungary. Competitions were conducted in main cities which were Lemberg (Lviv), Kyiv, Odessa, Kharkiv as the major European empires fell and were fragmented into many smaller national states. After failing to secure its independence in 1917–1920, Ukraine was torn apart by the Soviet Russia and former Russian province, the restored Poland.

The first recorded national (domestic) competition in Soviet Ukraine started in 1921 and was a competition among city teams (''Championship of cities'') that represented a participating city (or regional) championship. In Western Ukraine (East Galicia and Volhynia) that was part of Poland, ethnic Ukrainians declared official boycott at organization level and held separate competitions from the official Polish competitions. Later, however, some Ukrainian based clubs joined the "Piłka Nożna" (Polish football) competitions among which was Ukraina Lwów. Soon after the establishment of the Soviet Union in 1924 there was established the Soviet Championship of Cities. Unlike the Imperial Russian competitions, the Soviet competitions involved participation of national (or more correctly republican) teams. The Soviet Championship of Cities existed simultaneously along with republican level championships of cities in each union republic. In interbellum Czechoslovakia which secured control of Carpathian Ruthenia following the World War I, there existed regional competitions of eastern Slovakia and Carpathian Ruthenia and at one point local Rusj Uzgorod qualified for the Czechoslovakian State League.

The organization of the Ukrainian SSR Championship of Cities was organized by the All-Ukrainian Council of Physical Culture which was a republican institution and a branch of the Soviet All-Union Council of Physical Culture. In 1936 in the Soviet Union was organized first football competitions among teams of master or so called "exhibition teams" (pokazatelnye komandy) in four groups that acted as tiers. To the new Soviet competitions were selected several teams from the Ukrainian SSR. The new Soviet reform in football also made some changes to republican competitions. The Ukrainian SSR Championship of Cities was also reformed in 1936 where each city team was competing by representing its sports society, factory, mine, port, collective farm (kolkhoz) thus transforming into so called "Championship of Sports Societies and Departments". This way some Ukrainian teams competed at All-Union level and others at republican, however all Ukrainian teams played at the Ukrainian Cup including those that played at the All-Union competitions such as Dynamo Kyiv and Stakhanovets Stalino.

During World War II, the Soviet Union annexed territories of eastern Poland, and because of that competitions in Poland were disrupted. The previous clubs of the region were dissolved as national bourgeoise clubs and replaced with newly created Soviet "proletarian" clubs such as Spartak or Dynamo. Some former Polish players from the dissolved clubs joined the new Soviet counterparts, while others moved out of the country, were deported or pursued other goals. During the Nazi occupation there was no recorded national football competitions, but there were regional competitions. Czechoslovakia that was previously partitioned by its neighbors had its Carpathian Ruthenia occupied by Hungary and teams from the region joined the Hungarian competitions. Following defeat of the Nazi Germany and its allies, the Soviet Union resumed its domestic competitions including in the newly annexed Carpathian Ruthenia.

With the transformation of the council's (All-Ukrainian Council of Physical Culture) football section into the Football Federation of the Ukrainian SSR in 1959, the Ukrainian championship was integrated into the Soviet championship of Master teams in the Class B starting from 1960, which eventually was transformed into the Soviet Second League. The Championship of Sports Societies and Departments was reorganized into competitions of physical culture collectives, better known as the republican KFK competitions. In 1990 there took another transformation in Soviet football and all republican championships were relegated to the Soviet Second League B or the lower second league, while the Soviet Second League was split into three regional groups instead of previous nine (republican-regional factor). Several former Soviet republics started the process of secession from the Union, such as the Baltic states and Georgia. In 1992 the Soviet championship ended and the 1991–92 Soviet Cup that was planned to be transformed into the CIS Cup was in reality simply an edition of the Russian Cup.

¹ In 1998 KFK competitions were transformed into the Amateur Association.

² From 1993 through 1995 there existed the 3rd League. KFK competitions were grandfathered from the Soviet times.

³ In selected years there existed the supplemental 2nd League.

⁴ District 1.League and City 1.League

⁵ District 2.League and City 2.League

''Note:'' Until 1992 the Soviet Tier III was considered as the republican competition for the Ukrainian SSR (see Ukrainian Soviet competitions). In 1992 most of the Ukrainian-based clubs that competed in the top three tiers were reorganized into the Ukrainian Supreme League, while most of the rest non-amateur clubs were organized into the Ukrainian First League.

Football in post

Austria-Hungary Empire

Halychyna

Until the creation of independent competitions, the Ukrainian republican championship had taken place in the Soviet First League after the World War II, the Soviet Second League (since 1963) or in the lower levels of the competition. Three to six of the best Ukrainian clubs competed in the Soviet Top League with Dynamo Kyiv competing in it consistently since its establishment; the Ukrainian champion was considered the team that has won the Ukrainian republican group which was part of the Soviet lower leagues.

Until World War II up to six clubs from Ukraine competed in the Soviet Top League. The nine non-amateur clubs from Ukraine participated in the first season of the Soviet competition: Dynamo Kyiv ( I Division); Dynamo Dnipropetrovsk and Dynamo Kharkiv ( II Division); Dynamo Odessa, Spartak Kharkiv, Vuhilnyki Staline, Lokomotyv Kyiv ( III Division); Traktor Plant Kharkiv, Stal Dnipropetrovsk ( IV Division). In 1938 the Soviet Top League was combined into the Super League with 26 clubs playing each other once. Ukraine was represented by six clubs. The following couple of years as the League was reduced only three Ukrainian teams participated in it.

A short time after World War II Ukraine was once again represented only by Dynamo Kyiv. Since 1949 and until 1964 the club was joined by Shakhtar Donetsk and Lokomotyv Kharkiv at the Top Level. In 1956 Lokomotyv was replaced by Avanhard, known today as ''Metalist''. In 1965 Chornomorets Odessa returned to the Soviet Top League and was joined with the SCA Odessa. Since that time Ukraine had four clubs in the League. In 1967 as the Odessa Army team was relegated, Zorya Luhansk emerged and soon thereafter winning the honors. The Luhansk's team was the first club from a provincial city in the Soviet Union that earned the top award. The club success indicated the big football boom in the region. At the start of 1970 Chornomorets Odessa and Shakhtar Donetsk were replaced with Karpaty Lviv and Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk, respectively. By mid-1970s there were again six Ukraine clubs participating. Dynamo Kyiv earned the Cup Winners' Cup and the European Super Cup where in the finals it defeated ''FC Bayern Munich'' the captain of which was Franz Beckenbauer. In 1980 the representation of Ukraine was reduced back to five clubs with the classic four: Dynamo Kyiv, Shakhtar Donetsk, Chornomorets Odessa, and Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk. Since 1982, those four were joined by Metalist Kharkiv and stayed at the top level to its dissolution in 1991, coincidentally all five of them represent the five metropoleis of Ukraine with over a million in population. In 1990 Metalurh Zaporizhzhia joined the Soviet Premier League.

Ukrainian teams in the

Soviet Top League

¹Two points for a win. In 1973, a point for a draw was awarded only to a team that won the subsequent penalty shootout. In 1978–1988, the number of draws for which points were awarded was limited.

Ukrainian teams in the

Soviet First League

FC Dynamo Dnipropetrovsk, FC Dynamo Kharkiv, FC Silmash Kharkiv, Sudnobudivnyk Mykolaiv, FC Lokomotyv Kyiv, ''FC Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk'', ''FC Zorya Luhansk'', Spartak Kharkiv, Kharchovyk Odesa, ''FC Shakhtar Donetsk'', FC Lokomotyv Kharkiv, SKA Kyiv, Spartak Lviv, FC Krystal Kherson, FC Hoverla Uzhhorod, ''FC Metalist Kharkiv'', FC Dynamo Luhansk, Bilshovyk Zaporizhia, Lokomotyv Zaporizhia, FC Avanhard Kramatorsk, FC Shakhtar Stakhanov, FC Mukacheve, Spartak Kyiv, Torpedo Kharkiv, Dynamo Chernivtsi, SKA Lviv, Trudovi Rezervy Luhansk, ''FC Metalurh Zaporizhia'', SKCF Sevastopol, FC Spartak Ivano-Frankivsk, Kolos Poltava, SC Prometei Dniprodzerzhynsk, FC Zirka Kirovohrad, FC Dnipro Cherkasy, ''SC Tavriya Simferopol'', FC Nyva Vinnytsia, FC Veres Rivne, FC Lokomotyv Donetsk, ''SKA Odesa'', Temp Kyiv, FC Polissya Zhytomyr, FC Kryvbas Kryvyi Rih, ''FC Chornomorets Odesa'', FC Avanhard Ternopil, FC Shakhtar Horlivka, FC Bukovyna Chernivtsi, FC Volyn Lutsk, Naftovyk Drohobych, FC Desna Chernihiv, FC Podillya Khmelnytskyi, FC Sirius Zhovti Vody, FC Illichivets Mariupol, FC Khimik Sieverodonetsk, FC Frunzenets-Liha-99 Sumy, Trubnyk Nikopol, FC Hirnyk Kryvyi Rih, Shakhtar Oleksandriya, ''FC Karpaty Lviv'', FC Kremin Kremenchuk, FC Elektrometalurh-NZF Nikopol.

''Notes:''
* In bold are clubs that later also participated in the Ukrainian Premier League. In ''bold and italic'' are members of both Soviet and Ukrainian Top leagues.

The first decade (1992–2000)

The independent championship was hastily organized at the start of the spring of 1992 after creation of the Ukrainian Premier League. The League was created out of the six teams that took part in the Soviet Top League, two teams from the Soviet First League, and nine out of eleven out of the Soviet Second League. The other two of that eleven were placed in the Ukrainian Persha Liha as they were to be relegated no matter what. Also the two best teams of the Soviet Second League B of the ''Ukrainian Zone'' were placed in the Ukrainian Premier League along with the winner of the 1991 Ukrainian Cup holder that placed ninth in the same group. The 20 participants were split in two groups with winners playing for the champion title and runners-up for the third place. Three teams from each group were to be relegated. As was expected, the five favorites, Dynamo Kyiv, Shakhtar Donetsk, Chornomorets Odessa, Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk, and Metalist Kharkiv placed at the top of each group. In the championship play-off game in Lviv, a sensation took place as the Tavriya Simferopol beat Dynamo Kyiv 1–0. The Creamians earned the first Ukrainian title (thus far the only), losing only once to FC Temp Shepetivka.

After being stunned in the first championship by the ''tragedy'' in Lviv, Dynamo Kyiv was anxious to earn its first title on the second go. In the second championship that had a regular League format of 16 teams, the main rival of the Kyivans was Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk which won the first half of the season. By the end of the season both teams were going shoulder to shoulder and at the end they finished with the same number of earned points. The champion title was awarded to Dynamo Kyiv as they had better goal difference. Neither the ''Golden match'' or the fact that Dnipro had a better head-to-head record was considered.

The next seven years were known as the total hegemony of Dynamo Kyiv. During this period the Soviet stereotypes changed as some of the best teams were going into a crisis. After the 1993–94 season suddenly Metalist Kharkiv was relegated to the Persha Liha. In the 1995–96 season Shakhtar Donetsk had its worst year in the club's history, placing tenth. Chornomorets Odessa was relegated twice during that first decade after Leonid Buriak left the team. Also couple of newly created teams have emerged, Arsenal Kyiv and Metalurh Donetsk and, in addition, FC Vorskla Poltava has astonished everyone placing the third in the first club's season at the Top Level in 1997.

The decade of

Kyiv–Donetsk stand-off (2001–2010)

The next decade was marked by fierce competition between Dynamo Kyiv and Shakhtar Donetsk. Since 2000, Donetsk club proved to be the real challengers to Kyiv's dominance. In 2000 Shakhtar earned their first qualification to the Champions League and their place in the Group stage. Nonetheless, Dynamo is still considered the standard of excellence in the country and the primary feeder to the Ukrainian national football team. 2002 became the real cornerstone in the ''miners'' history when they earned their first national title under the management of the newly appointed Italian specialist, Nevio Scala, who managed to bring the Donetsk club to its next Ukrainian Cup title as well. Since that time the issue of foreign players became particularly acute and brought series of court cases (see Ukrainian Premier League#Players, Players section). The Football Federation of Ukraine, FFU and Professional Football League of Ukraine, PFL worked together to solve that issue, coming with the plan to force the ''transitional'' limitation of the foreign players over the time.

The clubs such as ''Dnipro'' and ''Chornomorets'' recent contenders for the title had to put up a fierce competition against the newly established contenders ''Metalurh'' from Donetsk and ''Metalist'' from Kharkiv (1972–73 European Cup, 1972–73, 1975–76 European Cup, 1975–76, 1981–82 European Cup, 1981–82, 1982–83 European Cup, 1982–83, 1984–85 European Cup, 1984–85, 1997–98 UEFA Champions League, 1997–98 – Quarter-finals, 1976–77 European Cup, 1976–77, 1986–87 European Cup, 1986–87, 1998–99 UEFA Champions League, 1998–99 – Semi-finals)
*FC Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk, Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk (1984–85 European Cup, 1984–85, 1989–90 European Cup, 1989–90 – Quarter-finals)
*Shakhtar Donetsk (2010–11 UEFA Champions League, 2010–11 – Quarter-finals)

UEFA Cup Winners' Cup

The following teams have qualified for elimination rounds in the UEFA Cup Winners' Cup.

*Dynamo Kyiv (1965–66 European Cup Winners' Cup, 1965–66, 1990–91 European Cup Winners' Cup, 1990–91 – Quarter-finals, 1974–75 European Cup Winners' Cup, 1974–75, 1985–86 European Cup Winners' Cup, 1985–86 – Winner)
*Shakhtar Donetsk (1983–84 European Cup Winners' Cup, 1983–84 – Quarter-finals)

UEFA Europa League / UEFA Cup

The following teams have qualified for elimination rounds of the UEFA Cup.

* Shakhtar Donetsk (2008–09 UEFA Cup, 2008–09 – Winner; 2015–16 UEFA Europa League, 2015–16 – Semi-finals)
* FC Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk, Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk (2014–15 UEFA Europa League, 2014–15 – Finalist)
* Dynamo Kyiv (2008–09 UEFA Cup, 2008–09 – Semi-finals)

Ukrainian clubs in the Soviet competitions

Ukrainian medalists of the Soviet first tier competitions

All-time table of Ukrainian clubs in the Soviet first tier competitions

List of records of Ukrainian clubs in the Soviet first tier competitions which over the years carried different names, only since 1971 they were known as the Soviet Top League which was established in place of the Class A Top Group (First Group).

Ukrainian medalists of the Soviet second tier competitions

All-time table of Ukrainian clubs in the Soviet second tier competitions

List of records of Ukrainian clubs in the Soviet second tier competitions which over the years carried different names, only since 1970 they were known as the Soviet First League which was established in place of the Class A First Group (Second Group).

Ukrainian medalists of the Soviet third tier competitions

All-time table of Ukrainian clubs in the Soviet third tier competitions

List of records of Ukrainian clubs in the Soviet third tier competitions which over the years carried different names, only since 1970 they were known as the Soviet Second League which was established in place of the Class A Second Group.

Ukrainian medalists of the Soviet fourth and lower tiers competitions

All-time table of Ukrainian clubs in the Soviet fourth and lower tiers competitions

List of records of Ukrainian clubs in the Soviet fourth and lower tiers competitions which over the years carried different names, only since 1970 they were known as the Soviet Second League B. In 1937 there also existed fifth tier.

In 1937 three more clubs from Ukraine competed in the 5th tier: Lokomotyv Dnipropetrovsk, Sudnobudivnyk Mykolaiv, and Spartak Kyiv.

Awards

;Other 2010 awards (ua-football.com readers):
Second symbolic team: Maksym Koval (footballer), Maksym Koval – Vitaliy Denisov, Milan Obradovic, Papa Gueye, Artem Fedetsky – Willian Borges da Silva, Willian, Fernando Luiz Rosa, Fernandinho, Oleksandr Aliyev, Denys Oliynyk – Taison, Artem Milevskyi – Coach: Myron Markevych
* Discovery of the season – Karpaty Lviv
* Best rookie – Yaroslav Rakytsky
* Best legionnaire – Darijo Srna
* Best Ukrainian player – Ihor Khudobyak (footballer, born 1985), Ihor Khudobyak
* Team of the season – Ukrainian national under-21 football team, Ukraine U-21

See also

* Football in Crimea
* Ukraine national football team
* List of football stadiums in Ukraine

References

External links

Soviet Championships prior to 1936

{{Sport in Ukraine

Football in Ukraine,

lt:Ukrainos futbolo sistema