Football in ... Kharkiv

Relative latecomers to football, Kharkiv has provided a constant presence among the Ukrainian elite without ever enjoying dominance.

For a city as renowned for sporting excellence as Kharkiv it is perhaps surprising that it can only count one team, FC Metalist Kharkiv, among the nation's elite, even if FC Kharkiv have also featured in the top flight.

Metalist's finest hour came with their USSR Cup triumph of 1988 but they have enjoyed other memorable cup runs – losing the 1983 final to FC Shakhtar Donetsk. The Donetsk outfit still have their measure today: Metalist have finished third in Ukraine's Premier League in each of the past five seasons, behind Shakhtar and FC Dynamo Kyiv.

The first documented game in the city took place on 6 May 1910, some 16 years after Lviv hosted the region's maiden match. The result is not known, though newspaper Yuzhniy Kray (Southern Region) reports First Kharkiv Football Team scored four times against the equally imaginatively named Second Kharkiv Football Club.

Fenix edged out both sides the following year in the first edition of the city championship, a competition that had expanded to 80 clubs by 1924 when the first unofficial USSR tournament was held. Featuring collective teams representing the Soviet Union's major cities and republics, Kharkiv beat Leningrad 2-1 in the final.

The USSR top flight was founded in 1936 but it was not until 1960 that Metalist finally graced it. Their time would come, however, and in 1988 they beat FC Torpedo Moskva 2-0 to become one of only 14 sides to claim the Soviet Cup.

Notable names
Goalkeeper Mykola Uhraitskiy starred for Metalist and Lokomotyv Kharkiv in the 1950s and 1960s, a hometown favourite in the mould of Mykola Korolyov and Volodymyr Linke – Metalist's top all-time scorers. Yet Kharkiv's best-known footballing son never played professionally in the city. Right-back Volodymyr Bezsonov, the Soviet Union's fifth most capped player, appeared in over 300 games for Dynamo Kyiv, earning six USSR titles, five Soviet Cups and the 1986 UEFA Cup Winners' Cup.

Other sports
Kharkiv has produced over 40 Olympic medalists, including Aleksey Barkalov (water polo), Rustam Sharipov (gymnastics), Lyudmila Dzigalova (athletics) and Yuri Poyarkov (volleyball). Then there is the Golden Fish, swimmer Yana Klochkova, who won four gold medals in Sydney and Athens. Men's volleyball team Lokomotyv Kharkiv are nine-times Ukrainian champions while another Lokomotyv is at the forefront of futsal in the country. Sisters Kateryna and Aliona Bondarenko were women's doubles champions at tennis's Australian Open in 2008.

Did you know?
Staying true to Kharkiv's plain-speaking tradition on club names, there is no mystery surrounding the origin of Metalist's moniker – the club were founded in 1925 by the local train building plant.