Summary
Ukraine national football team has representing own independent nation qualified for the FIFA World Cup once. That was in the 2006 tournament when they reached the quarterfinals led by the former Soviet football star player Oleh Blokhin. Ukraine also has several younger squads that were little more successful yielding several new promising footballers.
On the club level the Ukrainian championship has primarily developed out of the Soviet competitions. With the unification of Ukraine in 1939-1940 on the newly acquired territories other than the Soviet clubs were dissolved or partially integrated into Soviet competitions, including selected players from Pogon Lwow (Michał Matyas) and ST "Ukraina" (Karlo Miklyosh). Among the notable Soviet footballers of that period deserved to be mentioned such as Makar Honcharenko, goalkeeper Mykola Trusevych, and others. Dynamo Kyiv and Shakhtar Donetsk are among the big European clubs nowadays. Dynamo Kyiv traces its fame from the Soviet times as they won the European Cup Winners Cup twice; namely in 1975 and 1986. In 1975 Dynamo extended its success into the UEFA Super Cup as well. Among the famous players to come out of Ukraine were Oleh Blokhin and Andriy Shevchenko. Also the legendary coach Valeri Lobanovski who led Dynamo Kiev to their European Cup victories as well as coaching the former Soviet and later on the Ukraine national football team is a Ukrainian football hero.
The Ukrainian football professional club competitions 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 better perspective, please visit Ukrainian football league system. The 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 female clubs are Lehenda Chernihiv and Zhytlobud Kharkiv.
Ukraine has also highly developed children and youth football. There is a national competition that is being 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 age restrictions being 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 of that league successfully compete at student Olympics, the Universiada. The regional amateur football competitions also provide training opportunities for the young soccer stars.
Read more about this topic: Football In Ukraine
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