Ukraine Vyscha Liga 03/12 16:00 21 [1] Shakhtar Donetsk v FK Minai [16] W 2-0
Ukraine Vyscha Liga 03/08 16:00 20 [2] Shakhtar Donetsk v Kolos Kovalivka [8] W 3-2
Ukraine Vyscha Liga 03/03 16:00 19 [5] Shakhtar Donetsk v FC Kryvbas Kriviy Rih [2] W 5-2
Ukraine Vyscha Liga 02/26 12:40 18 [11] PFC Oleksandria v Shakhtar Donetsk [4] W DBFA
UEFA Europa League 02/22 20:00 636 Marseille v Shakhtar Donetsk L 3-1
UEFA Europa League 02/15 17:45 636 Shakhtar Donetsk v Marseille D 2-2
Europe Friendlies 02/03 10:00 - Shakhtar Donetsk v Hradec Kralove L 0-2
America Friendlies 01/25 15:00 - Shakhtar Donetsk v Lech Poznan W 3-1
Europe Friendlies 01/22 12:30 - Shakhtar Donetsk v Pyunik Yerevan W 2-0
Europe Friendlies 01/21 14:30 - Shakhtar Donetsk v Ludogorets Razgrad - Cancelled
World Club Friendlies 12/18 10:00 - Avispa Fukuoka v Shakhtar Donetsk D 2-2
UEFA Champions League 12/13 20:00 6 [2] FC Porto v Shakhtar Donetsk [3] L 5-3
Ukraine Vyscha Liga 12/08 15:00 17 [4] Shakhtar Donetsk v FC Veres Rivne [14] W 2-0
Ukraine Vyscha Liga 12/03 15:00 16 [4] Shakhtar Donetsk v FC Metalist 1925 [11] W 2-0
UEFA Champions League 11/28 17:45 5 [3] Shakhtar Donetsk v Antwerp [4] W 1-0
Ukraine Vyscha Liga 11/24 17:00 15 [4] Shakhtar Donetsk v Polissya Zhytomyr [2] D 0-0
Ukraine Vyscha Liga 11/12 17:00 14 [4] Shakhtar Donetsk v Dnipro-1 [3] L 1-3
UEFA Champions League 11/07 17:45 4 [3] Shakhtar Donetsk v Barcelona [1] W 1-0
Ukraine Vyscha Liga 11/03 15:00 13 [7] Dynamo Kyiv v Shakhtar Donetsk [4] W 0-1
Ukraine Cup 10/30 13:00 3 FC Viktoriya Sumy v Shakhtar Donetsk W 0-3
Ukraine Vyscha Liga 10/28 14:00 12 Chernomorets Odessa v Shakhtar Donetsk - Postponed
UEFA Champions League 10/25 16:45 3 [1] Barcelona v Shakhtar Donetsk [3] L 2-1
Ukraine Vyscha Liga 10/21 14:00 11 [3] Shakhtar Donetsk v LNZ Cherkasy [14] W 3-0
Ukraine Vyscha Liga 10/08 13:00 10 FC Zorya Lugansk v Shakhtar Donetsk - Postponed
UEFA Champions League 10/04 16:45 2 [4] Antwerp v Shakhtar Donetsk [3] W 2-3
Ukraine Vyscha Liga 09/30 14:00 9 [1] Shakhtar Donetsk v Vorskla Poltava [10] L 1-2
Ukraine Cup 09/26 14:00 4 FC Veres Rivne v Shakhtar Donetsk W 0-3
Ukraine Vyscha Liga 09/23 16:00 8 [6] FC Rukh Lviv v Shakhtar Donetsk [1] D 1-1
UEFA Champions League 09/19 19:00 1 Shakhtar Donetsk v FC Porto L 1-3
Ukraine Vyscha Liga 09/16 14:00 7 [1] Shakhtar Donetsk v Obolon Kyiv [11] W 1-0

Wikipedia - FC Shakhtar Donetsk

Football Club Shakhtar Donetsk (Ukrainian: Футбольний клуб Шахтар Донецьк, pronounced [fʊdˈbɔlʲnɪj ˈklub ʃɐxˈtɑr doˈnɛtsʲk], short nickname "miners") is a Ukrainian professional football club from the city of Donetsk. In 2014, due to the War in Donbas, the club was forced to move to Lviv, and had played matches in Lviv (2014–2016) and in Kharkiv (2017–2020) whilst having its office headquarters and training facilities in Kyiv. In May 2020, Shakhtar started to play home matches at NSC Olimpiyskyi in Kyiv.

Shakhtar has appeared in several European competitions and is often a participant in the UEFA Champions League. The club became the first club in independent Ukraine to win the UEFA Cup in 2009, the last year before the competition was revamped as the Europa League. FC Shakhtar Donetsk is one of two Ukrainian clubs, the other being Dynamo Kyiv, who have won a major UEFA competition.

The club formerly played its home matches in Donetsk at the newly built Donbas Arena, however due to the Russo-Ukrainian War in 2014, the team were forced to relocate 1,000 kilometres (620 mi) to the west in Arena Lviv in the interim. Following the winter break of the 2016–17 season the club then moved again to the Metalist Stadium in Kharkiv (250 kilometres (160 mi) to the northwest of Donetsk) early in 2017. In May–July 2020 Shakhtar played home matches at NSC Olimpiyskyi in Kyiv.

Shakhtar Donetsk is one of Ukraine's most popular football clubs, and is particularly favoured in the eastern Donbas region.

The club draws its history from the very start of the Soviet football league competitions and is one of the oldest clubs in Ukraine. The club was a member of the Soviet Voluntary Sports Society of Shakhtyor, having connections with other Soviet teams from Karaganda (Kazakhstan), Soligorsk (Belarus), among others. In the late Soviet period, Shakhtar was considered a tough mid-table club of the Soviet Top League and a cup competition specialist after winning the Soviet Cup two years in a row in 1961 and 1962.

The team has played under the following names: Stakhanovets (1936–46), Shakhtyor (Shakhtar) (1946–92), and FC Shakhtar (1992–present).

History

Early years – first two decades

The team in 1937.

The Shakhtar club was originally formed on a decision of the All-Union Council on Physical Culture and Sports of 3 April 1936. It was initially named Stakhanovets, meaning "the participant of Stakhanovite movement", which derived from Aleksei Stakhanov, a coal-miner in the Donbas and propaganda celebrity in 1935. The first team was based upon two other local teams, the participants of the All-Ukrainian Spartakiads: Dynamo Horlivka and Dynamo Stalino. The first game was against Dynamo Odesa as part of the 1936 Cup of the Ukrainian SSR (at that time known as Ukrainian spring challenge) and took place on 12 May 1936 at Balitsky Stadium in Horlivka (the first home stadium). The team that played as Stakhonovets Horlivka lost 3–2 after scoring the first goal by Mykhailo Pashchenko, the second goal belonged to Boris Terentiev.

Its first league game in Group V took place on 24 May 1936 against Dynamo Kazan was even more disappointing, which miners lost 4–1. Stakhonovets that had on its roster 15 players left for Kazan by train on 20 May. Beside players, as part of delegation there were representative of regional council of physical culture Gololobov and republican referee I.Rozanov. The team returned to Stalino on 28 May and the same day Gololobov in interview to newspaper "Stalinskiy rabochiy" told that "... the game in Kazan with local "Dynamo" was witnessed by 3,000 spectators. With the first minutes, the field hosts offered a high pace.

The "Miners", who were road weary, could not respond with the same. On the 13th minute they conceded the first goal and by the end of first half, two more. In many respects the reason was poor performance of right halfback Kutsev (who played instead of K.Pashchenko) and right outside forward Korotynsky. Through their flank Dynamo players successfully attacked. In the first half Stakhanovets forwards looked bleak and uncertain. In the second half the game equalized and on 55th minute Fedor Manov opened score to Donetsk team goals. Final score is 4:1 in favor of the hosts."

Nonetheless, the selective job conducted constructively by the club's administration allowed the club to compete successfully at the top level by the end of the 1930s. During the war championship of 1941, which was interrupted unexpectedly, the club defeated Soviet champions Dynamo Moscow and after about ten games were placed in fifth in the league. In the last game of that championship, played on 24 June, two days after the start of the Great Patriotic War, which they lost at home to Traktor Stalingrad. During the war many players went to frontlines and perished among which are Ivan Ustinov, Ivan Putyatov, Volodymyr Shkurov, Ivan Horobets, Mykhailo Vasin and others. From the pre-war squad in 1945 there were left only three players Georgiy Bikezin, Mykola Kuznetsov, and Petro Yurchenko.

The All-Union coal mining society of Stakhanovite (Stakhanovets) had changed its name in July 1946 to Shakhtyor (Shakhter) and so did the Sports Society of Donbas Miners. The term Shakhtar or Shakhter (Russian variation) is occupational referring to a miner working in a subterranean mining shaft (see shaft mining), the word "shakhtar" is a local adaptation and derivative of shaft. In the Soviet Union, due to an elevated risk working underground, a subterranean mining job was more compensated in relation to other unskilled work and always in demand.

In 1950, Viktor Fomin was named Ukrainian Footballer of the Year, despite the club finishing only 11th in the league. The first success for the team was in 1951, when it achieved third place in the USSR Championship. The most notable player of that achievement was the striker Aleksandr Ponomarev, who came to finish his football career in Donbas, the region he was born in, and was named Ukrainian Footballer of the Year for 1951. Despite the latest achievement, Shakhtar was relegated at the end of the 1952 season and as part of the re-organization of the team, former player Aleksandr Ponomarev became the head coach of the club. In 1954, Shakhtar under Ponomarev won the Class B League, thus sealing a return to the top league.

Cup triumphs and establishment in the Soviet League

A star in the Shakhtar Walk of Fame in honor of Oleg Oshenkov, who as manager twice led Shakhtar to Soviet Cup victory.

In 1958, the players of the club received fewer yellow and red cards than any other team in the championship, for what the Sovetsky Sport newspaper awarded the club with the "Fair Play Award." In the 1960s, Shakhtar, under Oleg Oshenkov's coaching, were three-time USSR Cup finalists, winning it twice in 1961 and 1962. Among the players playing for the club then where defenders Viacheslav Aliabiev and Vladimir Salkov. The club was nicknamed "The Cup Team" due to Shakhtar's success in vying for the trophy every year. The Miners' more notable achievements, however, occurred later from the mid-1970s to the early 1980s.

A star in the Shakhtar Walk of Fame in honor of Vitaliy Starukhin, considered by many fans the greatest player in the history of Shakhtar.

Despite the departure of the team's leader midfielder Anatoliy Konkov, in 1975, Shakhtar under management of former player Vladimir Salkov, earned second place in the USSR Championship and received the right to represent the Soviet Union in European competition. At the end of the season, Shakhtar received the Progress Cup for making the biggest progress from previous season in the league. They received the award again in 1977. In 1978, Shakhtar finished third in the USSR Championship.

In 1979, the team finished second in the league campaign and its captain—striker Vitaliy Starukhin—became the top scorer in the USSR Championship with 26 goals scored, also being named Soviet Footballer of the Year. The club was only two points away from the first place, despite having important players leaving the club before the season, and other important players receiving injuries.

Other important players besides Starukhin at the time were Mykhaylo Sokolovskyi, who went on to set a caps record for the club (for what he received the Club Loyalty Award in 1987), defenders Viktor Zvyahintsev and Valeriy Horbunov, who both made it numerous times to the 33 Top Players of the Soviet Championship lists, and goalkeeper Yuriy Dehteryov, who was named Soviet goalkeeper of the year and took third place for Soviet Footballer of the Year in 1977.

Shakhtar twice, in 1980 and 1983, brought home the crystal USSR Cup to Donetsk and in 1983, it won the USSR Super Cup over then-domestic league champions Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk. Shakhtar reached the 1983–84 European Cup Winners' Cup quarter-final, and strikers Viktor Hrachov and Serhiy N. Morozov became joint top scorers of the tournament. In 1987, Shakhtar received the fewest yellow and red cards in the championship, for which the club was awarded the "Soviet Top League Fair Play Award" by Man and Law magazine. Between 1982 and 1988, Shakhtar received the "Together With The Club" award five times, an award given for good organization of home games and behaviour of the home fans.

First decade in independent Ukraine – the beginning of the Akhmetov era

In the newly independent Ukraine, Shakhtar, along with Dynamo Kyiv, became perennial first place competitors. A bombing-assassination took place at the team's stadium, killing club president Akhat Bragin in October 1995. In 1996, Rinat Akhmetov took over as president and invested heavily in the club.

Despite Shakhtar not being a strong contender for the championship at the time, finishing second many times with a large point gap from the first-place position, they won the Ukrainian Cup three times, in 1995 (under the management of former player Vladimir Salkov), 1997 and 2001. In the 1997–98 UEFA Cup Winners' Cup, Shakhtar were eliminated after a 5–2 aggregate loss to Vicenza, losing the first and second legs. Important players at the time were defenders Serhiy Popov and Mykhaylo Starostyak, goalkeeper Dmytro Shutkov, striker Oleh Matvyeyev (who was top scorer of the Premier League in the 1996–97 season), and midfielders Hennadiy Orbu, Valeriy Kryventsov and Ihor Petrov. Most of the players playing for the team of the time came through the team's youth ranks.

Shakhtar's jersey with DCC instead of SCM

Towards the end of the decade, the team finally started to look like a team able to become champion. In 1999, a Shakhtar football academy was opened and now hosts football training for roughly 3,000 youth. In 2000, Andriy Vorobey was named Ukrainian Footballer of the Year by Komanda, the first Shakhtar player in independent Ukraine to do so, and became the top scorer in the 2000–01 Vyshcha Liha. That year, Shakhtar competed in the UEFA Champions League for the first time, drawn in a group with Lazio, Arsenal and Sparta Prague. They finished third in the group, qualifying for the UEFA Cup after a 3–0 home win against Arsenal.

First league triumph

President of the club, Rinat Akhmetov, shaking hands with captain Anatoliy Tymoshchuk, 2002 Ukrainian Footballer of the Year.

The club won its first ever Ukrainian Premier League title in the 2001–02 season under coach Nevio Scala, winning by a single point over Dynamo Kyiv. They were also victorious in the 2001–02 Ukrainian Cup, defeating Dynamo 3–2 after extra time in the final. Among the key players at the club at the time were captain defensive midfielder Anatoliy Tymoshchuk, striker Andriy Vorobey, midfielder Hennadiy Zubov and defender Mykhaylo Starostyak. At the end of the season, Tymoshchuk, who emerged as the club's leader on the field, was named Ukrainian Footballer of the Year by Komanda and Ukrainskiy Football.

Manager Mircea Lucescu took over Shakhtar in 2004 and has led them to becoming the dominant force in the league.

After multiple managerial changes, in 2004 the Romanian Mircea Lucescu was invited to build a team in Shakhtar. After ten days at the club, he won the 2003–04 Ukrainian Cup and after three months, for the first time in club history, the club made it to the UEFA Champions League group stage, which won him the 2004 Romania Coach of the Year title. The strategy chosen was looking for young talented players in Brazil, which was to form the base of the attack, while the defence would supplied by largely Ukrainian talent in order to adjust to rules forcing teams to have a certain number of local players on the field.

The large amount of Brazilians arriving at the club earned Shakhtar the nickname "the most Brazilian club in Europe". They won their second Premier League title in the 2004–05 season, but lost to Dynamo Kyiv in the inaugural Ukrainian Super Cup tournament in 2004. They finished as runners up in the 2004–05 Ukrainian Cup, losing to Dynamo in a penalty shoot-out the final.

They retained the Premier League crown in the 2005–06 season and managed to avenge the defeat to Dynamo in the previous Super Cup by defeating them on penalties to win their first-ever Super Cup title. At the end of the season, Anatoliy Tymoshchuk was named Ukrainian Footballer of the Year for by Ukrainian Football for the second time, becoming the first Shakhtar player to be named so more than once. Brazilian striker Brandão became the league's joint top scorer.

Shakhtar appeared in all three editions of the Channel One Cup, winning the 2007 edition and finishing runners-up in 2008. Having missed out on the league title in 2006–07, Shakhtar regained the title in 2007–08, also being victorious in the Ukrainian Cup after defeating Dynamo Kyiv 2–0 in the final. Shakhtar's attendance levels at league matches have continually risen over the years to a point where they averaged 36,983 spectators over the 2011–12 Premier League season.

UEFA Cup triumph and domination in Ukraine

Team captain Darijo Srna, one of the greatest players in the history of the team and considered by some "the icon of Shakhtar."

In 2009, they became only the second Ukrainian team to win a European competition (and the first since independence), and the first to win the UEFA Cup after defeating Werder Bremen in the final, with goals from Brazilians Luiz Adriano and Jádson. The victory earned the player Mariusz Lewandowski the 2009 Polish Footballer of the Year award. This also made them the last UEFA Cup winners before the tournament was rebranded as the UEFA Europa League.

Before the start of the 2009–10 season, Shakhtar won the friendly Uhrencup tournament. Shakhtar won the Premier League title in the 2009–10 season, goalkeeper Andriy Pyatov was named Ukraine Premier League MVP by Komanda, and Manager Mircea Lucescu was named Romania Coach of the Year for the second time. The 2010–11 season was a very successful one for Shakhtar. They reached the quarter-finals of the Champions League, their then-best-ever performance in the competition.

Captain Darijo Srna was chosen to be part of the Champions League Team of the Season as voted by fans. They also won a domestic treble with victory in the Premier League, Ukrainian Cup and the Super Cup. The successful season did not go unnoticed by the experts, and in 2011, the IFFHS gave Shakhtar a special award for making the biggest progress of the decade among football clubs.

They went on to win the Premier League and Ukrainian Cup in the 2011–12 season. Shakhtar player Yevhen Seleznyov topped the goal scoring charts in the league, with 14 goals, midfielder Henrikh Mkhitaryan was named Armenian Footballer of the Year, and manager Mircea Lucescu was named 2012 Romania Coach of the Year, receiving the award for the third time. The main players at that time were captain Darijo Srna, defender Yaroslav Rakitskyi, Armenian midfielder Henrikh Mkhitaryan (who was named Armenian Footballer of the Year twice while playing for Shakhtar) and Brazilian midfielders Fernandinho and Willian.

Henrikh Mkhitaryan was named the 2012 CIS Footballer of the Year and set the Ukrainian Premier League record for goals scored in one season (25).

In the 2012–13 season Shakhtar won the Premier League, Cup and Super Cup. Henrikh Mkhitaryan became the top scorer of the league, setting a Ukrainian championship record of 25 goals. He was also named the Ukraine Premier League MVP by Komanda, Armenian Footballer of the Year and the CIS Footballer of the Year for 2012.

Leaders depart, new titles and war in Donbas

Prior to the 2013–14 season, many of the club's main players were sold after Shakhtar accepted high bids for them – Henrikh Mkhitaryan, Fernandinho and Willian brought the club over €100 million. Shakhtar spent the following summer trying to integrate new young players into the team, who along with the remaining players were to form the backbone of the renewed Shakhtar. Despite selling its leaders, before the 2013–14 season, Shakhtar set a new record for East Europe for number of season tickets sold. Before the beginning of the 2013–14 season, Shakhtar won two friendly tournaments in Abu Dhabi, the Match World Cup, and the Super Cup of Champions played against Russian champions Zenit Saint Petersburg.

In the mid-season break, Shakhtar won the 2014 United Supercup (the second edition of the United Tournament), a tournament between the top-two placed clubs of Ukraine and of Russia, which strengthened Shakhtar's status as the strongest club in Eastern Europe. At the end of the 2013–14 season, Shakhtar won the Ukraine Premier League, while Luiz Adriano was the league top scorer. Shakhtar also won the 2014 Ukrainian Super Cup, holding the trophy for the sixth time. Manager Mircea Lucescu was named the 2014 Romania Coach of the Year, receiving the award for the fourth time.

Due to the war in Donbas, Shakhtar had to temporarily move and play its games in Arena Lviv, resulting in very low attendance. As an anti-war protest, the players of Shakhtar refused the initiative to wear the "Glory to the Ukrainian Army" shirts. In the 2014–15 UEFA Champions League, Shakhtar finished second in the group stage, therefore qualifying to the next stage. Striker Luiz Adriano equaled both Lionel Messi's record of five goals in a Champions League match and Cristiano Ronaldo's record of scoring nine goals in the group stage; as a result, UEFA named him MVP of the competition's group stage. Shakhtar finished the season second in the 2014–15 Ukrainian Premier League after playing the whole season away from Donbas, with Alex Teixeira finishing as a joint top scorer in the league. At the end of the season, Douglas Costa was sold to Bayern Munich, while Luiz Adriano moved to Milan.

While the club itself moved to a Ukraine-controlled zone, a few prominent Shakhtar players remained in the Donetsk People's Republic and supported the unrecognised state. Among them were former defender Viktor Zvyahintsev, former goalkeeper Yuriy Dehteryov, former Shakhtar and Ukraine national football team captain Ihor Petrov, and the club's first press officer Vyacheslav Sharafutdinov.

During the 2015–16 Ukrainian Premier League, on 16 October, Shakhtar beat Dynamo Kyiv 3–0 in Kyiv and set two new records. One record was that for the first time during a Klasychne derby game in Kyiv a team scored three goals. The other record was that for the first time Shakhtar had more Klasychne derby victories, 26, than Dynamo. In the middle of the season, Alex Teixeira moved to Chinese club Jiangsu Suning for a fee of €50 million, breaking both the Asian and Ukrainian transfer record. The club finished the 2015/16 season as runner up and Marlos was recognised best league player by Komanda. After the 2015–16 season, long-time manager Mircea Lucescu moved on to Zenit Saint Petersburg; he was replaced by the Portuguese Paulo Fonseca, previously of Braga.

Following the winter break of the 2016–17 season, a season when the club won the league, the cup, and the supercup, the club moved to the Metalist Stadium in Kharkiv (241 km to the north of Donetsk). In 2017–18, the club won the league and the cup again, with Facundo Ferreyra becoming the league top scorer and Marlos the league assist leader. In the 2018–19 season, the club won Ukrainian Premier League for the third time in a row. In 2019–20, Shakhtar retained their league title for the fourth time in a row. They also reached the semi-finals of the 2019–20 UEFA Europa League.


Shakhtar Donetsk is a professional soccer team based in Donetsk, Ukraine. The team was founded in 1936 and has since become one of the most successful clubs in Ukrainian soccer history. Shakhtar Donetsk has won numerous domestic titles, including 13 Ukrainian Premier League championships, 13 Ukrainian Cup titles, and 9 Ukrainian Super Cup titles.

The team plays their home matches at the Donbass Arena, which has a seating capacity of over 50,000 spectators. Shakhtar Donetsk is known for their attacking style of play, with a focus on quick passing and movement off the ball. The team has a strong youth academy and has produced many talented players who have gone on to play for top European clubs.

Shakhtar Donetsk has also had success in European competitions, reaching the quarter-finals of the UEFA Champions League on multiple occasions. The team has a loyal fan base and is widely regarded as one of the top teams in Eastern Europe.