football rambles

 Today we have the scarf that was in the very first post on this website when I visited Kharkiv back in 2008. At the time Metalist were European regulars and had finished 3rd in the league. Fast forward to 2020 and Metalist is now 2 clubs with my friends Metalist 1925 in their 3rd season in the first league and always looking like just missing out on promotion and the shiny new Metal team, who with the help of a lot of seasoned pros and players who have no business being there are pulling up trees in the second league. I have spoken about this on the Ukrfut podcast, but it looks like this version of the club (the badge still appears on the stadium) won't be reappearing any time soon. Metalist 1925 are playing their games there, Metal are playing at Arsenal stadium. A marriage of the two clubs would be beneficial long term, but in the short term 1925 are a fan ran club (more of that when the 1925 scarf appears) and Metal are a moneyed club, which may or may not include the former ow...

Well, thank god the winter break is over or so I thought until I saw that Arsenal were playing Zoria on Friday evening. As it turned out Respublikansky was re-opening and a crowd of 42,000 saw the game, which would have usually attracted about a tenth of that. Anyway, I used the opportunity to go to Kharkiv and catch up with some old friends, and check out the new stadium as well as a spot of tourism in what will be one of the venues for 2014. The journey there wasn't great we paid for first class tickets, but second class looked better. The first class compartment was tiny and for 6 people and came accompanied with a TV showing DVDs of ex-Soviet films everyone had seen a hundred times before. Therefore we went to 2nd class and indulged in a light refreshment or 6 before arriving in Kharkiv at 1230 where we were met by football journalist, Tolya Hamaev. After a couple of beers and a trip round the town, which took in the biggest square in Europe a monument to the ex-leaders of the...