Ukraine is a country with a long and rich football tradition. Yet football, like all aspects of life, have been deeply affected by the Russian aggression against the country. In this episode, co-hosts Guy and Francesco talk to Olga Ruzhelnyk, a Ukrainian researcher at the Institut des sciences sociales du politique in Paris. Olga explains how football is an important aspect of the recent history of the country, from they way football clubs and ultra groups have been political actors to Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine and occupation of Crimea and the impact it has had on football clubs, fans and ultra groups.
Olga's article, "Annexés et déplacés : les clubs de football ukrainiens de Crimée et du Donbass depuis 2014," which is mentioned in the episode, is available here. Her book chapter, "Ukraine," which provides a historical account of football in her country, was published in The Palgrave International Handbook of Football and Politics and can be accessed here.
Ukraine is a country with a long and rich football tradition. Yet football, like all aspects of life, have been deeply affected by the Russian aggression against the country. In this episode, co-hosts Guy and Francesco talk to Olga Ruzhelnyk, a Ukrainian researcher at the Institut des sciences sociales du politique in Paris. Olga explains how football is an important aspect of the recent history of the country, from they way football clubs and ultra groups have been political actors to Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine and occupation of Crimea and the impact it has had on football clubs, fans and ultra groups.
Olga's article, "Annexés et déplacés : les clubs de football ukrainiens de Crimée et du Donbass depuis 2014," which is mentioned in the episode, is available here. Her book chapter, "Ukraine," which provides a historical account of football in her country, was published in The Palgrave International Handbook of Football and Politics and can be accessed here.
Ukraine's Football under the Russian Shadow ft. Olga Ruzhelnyk
Guy Burton 00:21
Hello and welcome to another edition of the FootPol Podcast, where football meets politics. I'm one of your co -hosts, Guy Burton, and I'm joined by my other co -host, Francesco Belcastro. Francesco, how are you doing today?
Francesco Belcastro 00:30
I'm fine, Guy. How are you?
Guy Burton 00:32
Yeah, not too bad. Not too bad. Do you know what we're talking about today?
Francesco Belcastro 00:35
Football, politics and Ukraine and the Ukrainian crisis?
Guy Burton 00:39
Yeah, so we're joined today actually by a very great guest who can talk to us about the situation in Ukraine and football in Ukraine. And it's Olga Ruzhelnyk, a postdoc fellow at the Institute of Social Sciences and Politics in Paris.
Guy Burton 00:55
She did her PhD in Social and Political Science at the Université de Paris de Nanterre, where she examined the political role of Ukrainian football fans, particularly around the Maidan in 2014. And so, Olga, welcome to the show, thank you for joining us.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 01:10
Oh, my pleasure. Oh, hello from a very rainy Paris today. That's really great. Preparing for the Olympic Games.
Guy Burton 01:18
Pretty, pretty, pretty wet spring. Probably wet summer as well. Listen Olga before we start so one of the things we always like to ask guests is if you have a football team who are they and how are they doing how do you feel about them?
Olga Ruzhelnyk 01:30
Yeah, I was a plural. I have teams. Because I would say that I'm a admirer of football. I love football in general. And it depends on the league that I have some of my favorites there. And I was growing up talking about United Kingdom in England.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 01:51
I'm pretty sure that some people are going not to like me. But I was growing up during the period when those Red Devils on Old Trafford with Alex Ferguson was so glory. And I'm sticking to them. And I'm sticking to Manchester United in the United Kingdom in England in Premier League.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 02:09
I think in France, I would say, though I'm living in Paris, I support more Lyon.
Francesco Belcastro 02:17
Mm -hmm
Olga Ruzhelnyk 02:18
I would like the spirit of Lyon more. And if you go with me to Ukraine, my team is Metalist. I'm from Kharkiv originally. There's been quite a journey for this team because it went bankrupt in 2015.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 02:34
Then we have a new football team that called Metalist 1925 that emerged on the ashes., rebirth from the bankruptcy. They emerged from the ashes, this team. And I'm sticking to them. They're the last ones right now currently in the Ukrainian team league, but they take it into consideration the circumstances, I guess...
Olga Ruzhelnyk 02:56
I'm just happy they are still alive and still existing. So good for me now.
Guy Burton 03:03
So can you, can we then start talking about, you know, because you've, you've alluded to, you know, Ukrainian football team right there. I mean, could you give us an overview of the, you know, Ukrainian football itself?
Guy Burton 03:11
I'm like, who are the big teams? You know, which, which cities do they come from? Um, you know, what, what sort of social classes or, you know, identities do they represent?
Olga Ruzhelnyk 03:21
I would say, again, this is such a dynamic picture, I cannot look at Ukrainian teams in football in the very static way. So if I'm going with a golden era, golden period of football, let's take after 2012 Euro Cup when it took place in Ukraine and Poland, and before 2014, the beginning of the war in Donbas, because it's really shocked so much the football world.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 03:53
I would say, well, top five will go Dinamo Kyiv, Shakhtar Donetsk, Metalist Kharkiv, Dnipro, they went into the final of Euro Cup. And then Sintropol, no Sintropol was before, but anyway, I would say top four for sure, everything, the fifth place is all the time changing.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 04:17
Since 2014, I think after 2014, we had two teams that disappeared out of those top four, it's Metalist and Dnipro. And bear in mind, they were really, really top football clubs, they were participating in the international competitions because the owners of those clubs were, in particular from the Metalist Kharkev, were linked to the President Yanukovych at the time, and they were linked to the Russian money.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 04:49
They fled the country, they left the clubs in quite a difficult situation, and they unfortunately went bankrupt. So right now, comparing to just 10 years ago, we have absolutely different- um... football atmosphere... at a football map of Ukraine. Still we have Dynamo, of course, we still have Shakhtar. We have still Zohya Luhansk from Luhansk, so the period, the city that's occupied since 2014 and still playing, it still exists.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 05:18
Yeah, and there's still there's some matches, but though they're taking place only on the west side of the country, of course, as far as possible from the war front line. So still exists, still kicking the ball.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 05:31
Those- that balls are kicking still.
Francesco Belcastro 05:33
But I ask you one thing? So these main clubs, do they get support from particular social classes? Do they reflect particular identities? Do you say that this is a thing that exists in Ukraine or is more regionalized so people from a region will support one club?
Francesco Belcastro 05:50
How is the map in that sense?
Olga Ruzhelnyk 05:53
It's so much different from what you can see in England or even France, very different. We need to understand that those clubs, and let's go differently. Ukraine is still the country that has, I don't want to like... post -Soviet, but it had Soviet past, right?
Olga Ruzhelnyk 06:14
So the stratification of the society is different. There is not such thing as like middle class, high class, working class. There's still, it's been 30 years, it's not even one whole generation after the end of the Soviet period.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 06:30
So the football clubs themselves, they cannot be like the clubs over the workers or the clubs over the elite. There's no such thing. And for the political identity, what we can see when I was studying this, there is no really... Over the football itself,
Olga Ruzhelnyk 06:48
maybe if we go about supporters or ultras, as we say them. Yeah, there are some political ideas that they're sharing. And there's not such a variety of those views. We had before 2014, I think there was only one major football club that had ultras that presented more left wing views was CSKA Kyiv.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 07:12
But then even after 2014, they, well, first of all, they ceased to exist. And second of all, even ultras, they became like a part of like kind of not Dinamo Kyiv, but still like this global movement of football fans.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 07:26
But so anyway, there is no such spectrum of political views in Ukraine. They're quite, I would say, right. How extreme it goes, it depends. But of course, it's on the right spectrum. It's really patriotic, nationalistic, of course, and after 2014, it's really anti-Russian, I would say.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 07:48
But so there is no like spectrum.
Francesco Belcastro 07:52
Now let's go a bit back to the Soviet era, because for our listeners who are a bit aware of the history of football in Soviet Union, some of the main characters, some of the main players and managers during the Soviet era were actually Ukrainians.
Francesco Belcastro 08:06
I mean, one can think about Lobanovskyi probably as the main kind of reference for a very, very long period, at least for like a Western audience. Can you tell us a bit about the role of sort of Ukrainian football during the Soviet era, and would you say that some of the legacies still remain in terms of the politics of the game and the game itself?
Olga Ruzhelnyk 08:31
I would say like what Ukraine brought to Soviet sport and what Soviet sport brought to Ukraine, right. This is like two ways of looking at this process. Well, the first of all, football was shaped in Soviet Union, the way how even the teams are called, right.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 08:48
Dinamo Kiev, Dinamo, it's the name of the teams that originally was linked to milit-, military and KGB. Yes, so the Dinamo, this is like, CSKA was the army.
Francesco Belcastro 09:02
Mm -hmm.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 09:02
So of course there are some not legacies but of course there's the links to this origins like yes right of course it was before we had a very interesting story about Dinamo Kiev and the use of the myth of the death match. I don't know if you know about this match. But the death match or match of the death of death - I don't know how even to translate it really properly in English - so it was the story how Dinamo Kiev played during the second world war and occupation of Kiev against the occupiers from SS or from Nazis and they won and in retaliation they were killed and executed by the Nazis. That's the myth. I just, I really worked it in the archives about this. It's myth. It's not really the truth but it was reused really much by the Soviet propaganda as a symbol of resistance. So i would say this Ukrainian kind of view like... At least Dinamo Kiev was used in the Soviet propaganda to build this area of resistance against the Second World War, etc. Though story, to to tell you the truth, what happened so in the archives we can find that a lot of the players were killed actually after the liberation of Kiev by the Soviets itself . So not really sticking to the to the the real story, the real fact or the myth. And so there are indeed the inputs from Ukrainian football into the Soviet vision of the football, I would say and the Soviet input into the Ukrainian. However to understand what is football in those countries that are surrounding the center - because Soviet Union at least is this really centristic country - there is a central Russia and there is periphery of those countries around it. And the football over there and the spirit over there was really anti -central if you look at the ideology of the football fans. If you go... Same thing it's not the the only thing really unique for Ukraine. If you go to the Lithuania Latvia, all the Baltic countries, if you go to Georgia into dynamodbilisi it was the same thing so when the football was between the clubs of Ukraine and Russia for example, from Moscow, from CSKA or Spartak Moscow, that was the match, it was the game. It was against the center of the empire and when the football fandom the movement started to appear it was shaped under this resistance towards the cente. So to- to tell you that that this anti -Russian movement or anti -Moscow spirits are quite oh shocking and outstanding and and quite unique... No not true. If you go to Zalgiris Vilnius, same thing. If you go to Dynamo Tbilisi, same thing. It's really anti anti -Moscow.
Francesco Belcastro 12:09
Would you say that that's because football was a space where this kind of anti -central or anti -Russian sentiment could be expressed? Was there a bit of more room to express them on the stands than there was in other contexts, would you say?
Olga Ruzhelnyk 12:22
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Again, not not unique thing. Look at the Franco and regime of Franco and in Spain, and Bilbao or Basque countries and Catalonia. It was always this football was always this space, the safe space for the creation of a subculture, youth subculture.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 12:43
This is the space where they can be a little bit united, young boys, and their fraternity. And this is the space to show those ideology, not ideology, but I would say the views, the political views on the stand.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 12:58
In the Soviet Union, how it how it actually those movements happened. Everything started in the in England, of course, with the with the football, and then through the games between Spartak Moscow and some British clubs.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 13:13
And then, by the way, Dynamo Kiev, Metalist played with Tottenham, I think in the 70s and 80s. Supporters started to learn about this wonderful subculture of hooligans and - not ultra at the time- but the hooligans, right, the real supporters from the stand there, and they brought those tendencies in Soviet Union.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 13:37
So this is how it kind of like was taken from the West and brought to Soviet Union. It was the period of perestroika of Gorbachev, when the the first time that they say politics of class must mean in that this limitation of information was not as strict as it was before.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 14:01
So the people could start to read some articles from the Western world, etc. So it went like a building a snowball, like a snowballing from out of there. And the movement grew, grew, grew, grew, grew, grew.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 14:15
Really nationalistic. Why? Because it was already the mixture of British hooliganism and Italian ultra movement, which was already had this idea of nationalistic movement. And in the 90s, in the independence of Ukraine, it really, really grew.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 14:35
And it became really close to the nationalistic movement.
Francesco Belcastro 14:40
Interesting. So we sort of, we got to the 90s and independence of Ukraine and you already kind of told us about some of these trends and factors that emerged in the previous period. Would you say that kind of the 90s and this anti -Russian or nationalist feelings, were they then reflected in the 90s?
Francesco Belcastro 15:03
Did they kind of sort of grow with the development of an independent country? Did the meaning change or would you say it's just a continuation in terms of the politics of the clubs, in terms of funds themselves that you mentioned are central?
Olga Ruzhelnyk 15:19
Absolutely, yeah. I would say the anti -central movement, I would say like this anti -centralistic, centralist movement, because we're talking about still the logic of imperial country, where you have a centre, you have a periphery.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 15:32
This is like the logic. So in the 80s, when there was already, you can see the end of the regime, there was the movement for independence movement, nationalistic movement in Ukraine as well. The first in 1986, there was a game between Dinamo Kyiv and Spartak Moscow, and the biggest fight, the first fight that took place in Kyiv, it was the hundreds and hundreds of football fans there.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 15:57
Then afterwards, it was like a little bit anecdote, a little bit of the story that even in the 80s, there was a unit called Anti -Moscow Pact, Anti-Moscow Unit. So who was that? It's football fans from Lithuania, a couple of teams, Lithuania, Latvia and three teams of Ukraine.All the football fans kind of signed a pact that they are going to participate or help each other to beat Moscow fans in case their team is going to play against.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 16:28
But when you said like the politics of the clubs, that we're not, if you're talking about politics of the club, then we go to economic to understand how they financed. And in the 90s and in the early 2000s... Who am I'm kidding? Between before 2014.
Francesco Belcastro 16:45
Mmhmm.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 16:46
The owners of the clubs, the majority of them, they were oligarchs and oligarchs are really close the money to Russia. So they would never be able to show their identity, there's not a political thing that was there on the display, it was just the business, nothing more.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 17:05
But if you talk about the football fans, I cannot say that all of them were anti -Russian. If you look at Kharkiv, if you look at Odessa, their football movements before 2014 are friendly with Spartak Moscow.
Francesco Belcastro 17:20
Mm -hmm.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 17:21
And they were quite, quite friendly about that one. So they were never, even though they were anti, I would say Moscow, they were really patriotic, nationalistic, they still maintained quite a good ties with the movement in Moscow.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 17:34
Of course it changed up to 2014.
Francesco Belcastro 17:37
Mm -hmm.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 17:38
But it was the case. It was never like everybody going to not talk to, I would say like this, it was anti Moscow, anti Putin, but it was not that anti Russian before. This is maybe like a small nuance.
Guy Burton 17:51
Yeah, can I ask them because before we get to 2014 as well, there is of course, 2004, the Color Revolutions, right? That were happening in Georgia or Ukraine. Yeah, sorry. Specifically in the Ukrainian case, it was orange.
Guy Burton 18:04
And that we saw at the time, certainly in the West, we saw this, this tension between, you know, sort of, you know, Ukrainian nationalism and Russian influence in that election. Did that have any kind of manifestation at a footballing level as well?
Olga Ruzhelnyk 18:20
I know that in 2001, there was a protest against Kuchma, who was a president at the time, and his ties to Russia. And I know that the fans from Dynamo Kiev participated. In 2004, when I spoke to everybody, they said that the people participated, but they did it individually.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 18:46
They were not participating as the team of football fans, as the ultras. And in 2014, that's changed. Of course, they were there as football fans, as ultras, and as the team. Before it was individual.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 19:01
So they did protests in the [football] stands before. There was already manifestations of these political ideas and slogans. On the tribune before, it was in 2011, in 2010, against the reforms of police. So they were already kind of vocal in their political and ideological views.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 19:30
But really, the first participation as the force, as ultras, as football fans, was in 2014.
Guy Burton 19:40
So if you could, could you just sort of, you know, for the listeners, sort of give us a little bit of context and understanding as to what was happening politically in Ukraine back in 2013, 14, and how the and how the football ultras became involved in that process.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 19:56
Okay, I will try again. I can go way back in the time. In 2013, we had President Viktor Yanukovych, who had the ties with the Russian government. And there was an agreement from the European Union, a trade agreement with the European Union.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 20:14
It was prepared for years and years and years. And it was the time to sign this agreement. And last moment, Yanukovych backed down and he didn't sign the agreement. In the protest, there was a group of students who went to protest in the Maidan, so in the center of Kiev, a couple of hundreds, not more.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 20:36
And they stayed for the night. And on one day in, I would say October, in November, I think, 2013, we're talking about 2013. The special forces of the police came and they really violently repressed and dispersed those protesters as a reaction for injustice, police injustice.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 21:02
Thousands and thousands and thousands of people came to the protest. And again, snowballed to a change in for the signature or against this behavior of Yanukovych of refusing to sign the agreement, to really revolutionary movement of changing the government itself.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 21:21
And because the tactics that was used during the Maidan was quite outstanding. From the side of the government, I would say, some quite interesting elements were hired to attack the protesters. We called them Titushkis.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 21:38
So those were the guys who were really sporty guys. Most of the time, they were doing martial arts and they were paid by the government to being dressed in civilian clothes and attack the protesters.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 21:51
And there were quite a lot number, I would say, of those Titushkas were there. And this is what ultras told me, why there was one of the motivation, why they were involved. And they say, well, this is injustice because those very well -trained, sporty guys attacking women and children and of course, they do not stand a chance.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 22:13
So we are the only one, we get used to be in the fights, we get used to face that type of guy. So that's why we started to be present and protect the people from those Titushkas in particular. And I would say the key of ultras, they joined first, already starting in November, they were already there.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 22:36
And that's quite interesting because they said, as I told you, there was a CSKA Kiev, there was really far left, I would say, communistic ideology, and Dynamo Kiev, they were right. And they were all the time fighting each other, they were enemies forever and ever and ever.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 22:53
And they said that this is during the first time, even in November, those two groups of ultras, they were together fighting against the Titushkas. So the first unification happened that time. And then in January, there was a publication of the announcement that all the football movement of ultras, of Ukraine, kind of signed an agreement, peace agreement, that they were not going to attack each other, they were not going to fight between themselves until the crisis will be gone.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 23:24
The thing is, the crisis has never gone. Since 2014, we have 10 years and they're still happening. So then, not just Maidan in Kiev, the football ultras participated in Kharkiv, ultras participated in Donetsk, a lot, a lot, a lot of them.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 23:45
In Luhansk as well, before occupation, in Crimea, all of the ultras from Crimea right now in the black list...
Francesco Belcastro 23:54
Mm -hmm.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 23:55
...of the FSB and they are, some of them are in prison, some of them can be disappeared but most of them things got kind of fled to Ukraine.
Francesco Belcastro 24:04
Sorry Olga, the FSB is...?
Olga Ruzhelnyk 24:05
Yeah, it's the KGB, but in Russia right now, so KGB was Soviet.
Francesco Belcastro 24:11
Can I just remind the listener that they should really check out two episodes that we've done that complement very well what Olga says. One with James Montague on the politics of football fans, which really kind of gives a broader world context.
Francesco Belcastro 24:24
And then there are a lot of parallels between what Olga was telling us and what Luisa Turbino Torres was telling us a few weeks ago on the politics of fans in Brazil. So really, really listeners should check this out.
Guy Burton 24:37
And if I may, just add another episode there as well, because when Olga was telling us about sort of the, was it the match of death, you know, sort of the Dynamo Kiev players who played against the Nazi occupiers, we touched upon that story a bit as well, with Chris Lee of Outside Write, when we talked about football and fascism back in January, if you recall, Francesco.
Guy Burton 24:57
Olga, so if you could sort of tell us, so we're talking about 2014 and, you know, obviously after the revolutionary developments of the Maidan, you know, Russia does annex Crimea. So what happens to football in the Crimea after that period up until 2022?
Guy Burton 25:18
What's the state of the clubs, the infrastructure, the situation there?
Olga Ruzhelnyk 25:23
Well, it's very interesting thing. I wrote an article about this, but it is in French, if so, if somebody wants to read this in the journal called football, quite regional, right? Football. Yeah, and it's, yeah, it's called "Annexés et déplacés", so it's like "Annexed and Displaced."
Olga Ruzhelnyk 25:42
So this is the history of those football clubs, and especially of the club. So from the Crimea, I'm writing about what happened with football clubs from Crimea, and from Donetsk and Luhansk. And then if you took about Donetsk and Luhansk, two major clubs, Shakhtar and Zorya, they were, as I said, displaced.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 26:00
So if you talk about Donetsk, let's talk about them, they were displaced first to Kiev.
Francesco Belcastro 26:07
Mm -hmm.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 26:08
Then they went to Kharkiv, because Kharkiv Metalist went bankrupt, so they had a wonderful stadium, Metalist for 40 ,000 people, Olympic standards, et cetera. So they used it, then they went to Lviv, they go back to Kharkiv, so it was quite a journey.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 26:27
And Luhansk did the same, they were kind of bouncing between the cities, which is kind of sociologically interesting to see about the supporters, you know, all the time you support your team and your local team and what is happening when the major teams are...
Olga Ruzhelnyk 26:43
It's another story. And as for the Crimea, that was kind of interesting. If you're talking about Simferopol, at some point there were two teams of Simferopol with almost the same logos, with the same names, almost, like everything was almost the same.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 27:01
Why? Because Ukrainian Simferopol that was in the Ukrainian Premier League, they moved, they were displaced to Kherson.
Francesco Belcastro 27:11
Mm -hmm.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 27:11
So they just went up. And at their places on the infrastructure, so they lost all the infrastructure, the team was there. The owners were there on the Ukrainian side, but everything else left, of course, stayed in Crimea.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 27:27
So with the occupation, again, some of the personnel stayed in Crimea. We're not going to ignore that too. So some of the people who worked before to Simferopol Ukraine, they stayed in Simferopol Kiev occupied by Russia, annexed Crimea, sorry.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 27:47
And they repainted the colors, basically, they just added, it was like red and blue, they added white. So it became like three color of...
Francesco Belcastro 27:59
Mm hmm.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 28:01
...of Russian flag. And it was really a strange time at the time. So they asked UEFA to allow them to participate in Russian league, to enter a Russian league to play. And UEFA said yes at the beginning.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 28:21
But there was a huge feedback, negative feedback and uproar against that decision. And afterwards they back down and they say, okay, no, we're not allowed any this. And that's why they created the own league called Crimea League.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 28:39
And they played in Crimea. And sometimes they just have the friendly matches between the Russian teams, but they were not part of the team at that time.
Francesco Belcastro 28:49
As you mentioned, it's been 10 years now of crisis, of Russian assault, essentially, in different stages. Now, I would assume that this is, we know sort of the high profile cases you mentioned, Shakthar, but I would assume that this has created like a massive problem or like football infrastructure at grassroots level.
Francesco Belcastro 29:13
I mean, probably like federation... lower down and grassroots tournaments and they probably struggling to just cope. I mean, it's a lot of young men, they're not playing football anymore. It's not the most serious issue,
Francesco Belcastro 29:26
but can you tell us a bit of a picture of, give us a picture of where we are there in terms of the whole impact on football movement infrastructure? I know it's a big question, but yeah.
Guy Burton 29:38
Especially since 2022 and... Yeah.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 29:40
Yeah, I would say it's impossible to predict how it will be in the future because I can tell you that I wrote two articles in 2020 and this is how I wrote: like I have no idea. Like this is the article that I'm pretty sure how you found me through the article in the political science review! Yeah in the end this is 22.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 30:02
Everything depends and we will see how the football will be in Ukraine depends on the outcome of this war. What we know as of 2020, I would say the football infrastructure in most - of course - eastern cities, towns and north destroyed. Chernihiv for example, I've seen that there was the bomb in the stadium. Maybe they reconstructed it. I'm not sure. This is, this is what I'm not sure because of course they're not like posting the pictures like hey just in cases they're going to bombard it again. But the infrastructure is... yeah it's under this is very difficult about Ukrainian war. We cannot talk about this in the past terms because we're talking about the present ongoing, very hot war. It's not cold, it's really hot and we don't know what's happening right now when what will happen in one month or two months. I spoke about Kharkiv, my native town, my native city and at some point I was writing about it as like the aggression and attack against Kharkiv was already over. No, it's not, it's happening right now. We are talking in May 2024 and it's under the attack right now. The stadium is still there but will it be there in the future? So what is happening right now? The eastern side... People are still practicing football. That's, this amazing thing that I mean. My family is in Kharkiv and they say there are still people who are going on the pitch playing football, they're still love... It's, we are really football country, football loving country there. But the, the matches between the teams they're kind of moved into central verse slash west side whereas more come... Of course it's not the same. It's not 10 000 people. Some people coming to see it but not that much because right now there is regulation that you need to... If there are some massive event it should be underground. So the concerts and things like this they must take place underground in the shelters, bomb shelters. Football impossible to be done, so there are still limitation on the the amount of people who can come. But it's outstanding and I think it's really amazing that Ukraine may still manage to keep it alive, to keep football alive. Because at the beginning I think of 2020 there was no games in the premier league, Ukrainian premier league. There were only uh football matches like friendly football matches for the nation to raise the money between I don't know that this Bayern Munich, Dynamo Kiev and things like this. So they were just just the football like this. And at some point in 2022 of course it was not a priority, but me as the football lover, I was a little bit like, I don't know we will survive that long, because you can have a pause for six months. But if you have two year pause, or three year pause, the whole... You may imagine like the, all the financing, the football players, etc, they just gone.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 33:04
And that's all. So yeah, but so it's still alive. Football in Ukraine is still alive. It's still interesting. Shakhtar is still playing at the Champion League. And then we're still, it was still there.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 33:15
But as far, I cannot go as far as give the prediction for the six months, for the one year. That's, that's quite, that's quite difficult to do. Why we have Shakhtar right now is our our president of the League of the Federation.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 33:30
So we'll see. We'll see.
Guy Burton 33:32
So one thing I'm also curious about though Olga, I mean we talked a little bit about the impact in the country and on the infrastructure as well. But of course Ukraine has also qualified for the Euros which are taking place in June.
Guy Burton 33:44
So I wonder if you could tell us a little bit about, I mean you said it's hard to predict, but can you tell us a little bit about how Ukrainians are responding to this and what do they expect the team to do in Germany?
Olga Ruzhelnyk 33:56
Oh, to win. Not to win, not to win, not to win, but to have a really good game! I think we should really, sport is such a powerful thing for the people that are suffering from war. I know how much you're into box [boxing], but quite a couple of weeks ago, there was [Tyson] Fury against Oleksandr Usyk.
Francesco Belcastro 34:19
Yeah.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 34:20
It gives a lot to the people, into the conditions and circumstances that Ukraine has. And, you know, it's quite interesting because I spoke with my friends who were there and they're like, look, it's like an analogy of Ukraine.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 34:35
Usyk is so much smaller and nobody thought that he's kind of underdog against the bigger, more, I don't know, popular type of fighter. And then he won. And so it kind of gives it this parallel with Ukraine versus Russia.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 34:51
And it's just, I think it's goes really nice for the football, of course, as well. It gives a little bit the aptitude and the spirit of the boys is going to play good and they're going to show really good results.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 35:03
I don't know how much time we do have, but quite recently, and this is why I haven't, it's in my mind, I quite recently saw the documentary about this... Talking about Euro. There was the time of qualifications for Euro 2000, the only two times then Ukraine faces Russia on football pitch.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 35:24
That was for qualification for that Euro. And it was 2000, 1998, 1999, two games. So the first game was against Russia in Kiev. It was in 1998. They came and there was 3-2 for Ukraine. So Ukraine won at that time.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 35:50
And in the group, there was France as well, Iceland. So kind of like a very tough group to go. France would qualify first for sure, because it was especially 1998, 1999. It's the champions of the world at the time, the Zidane and stuff.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 36:08
And so they qualified first. So there was like a fight for the second place to go to the playoff round to qualify for Europe. So it was really between Europe, Ukraine and Russia at the time. So the second game was in 1999.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 36:24
It was in Moscow. And the state of the group was at that time that for Russia, draw would be equal to losing. And for Ukraine, draw will equal to at least go into the playoffs to try to get into into Europe.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 36:45
And we have 1-1, we had the draw to all the guys, etc. And when I saw this documentary, I was too young. I'm from 1991. I was like nine years old. I don't really register that in my head. But I spoke with my cousin who is three years older than me.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 37:04
And he remembers that game like it was yesterday.
Francesco Belcastro 37:09
And he's like, he remembers all the emotions and all those like things when there was like great performance against the enemy, not the enemy, against the rivalry that we had this on the pitch and outside.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 37:20
And this is something that he's like, Oh, sometimes then I feel bad. I'm going to YouTube and I'm watching those, like just highlights of the time of the game, of that game that was in 1999. So imagine the football, it has therapy qualities, I would say to the, to the people who are really searching.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 37:38
I really hope that our team will perform really well and will bring joy and comfort to the people who need them.
Francesco Belcastro 37:47
Now, both me and Guy are sort of Middle East scholars in terms of academic terms. And there's often this comparison between what's happening in Gaza and what's happening in Ukraine. And now supporters of the Palestinian cause often argue that, you know, look at Ukraine, Russia has been kicked out of football immediately, even though it's not entirely true, because in a way they've been kind of readmitted, whatever.
Francesco Belcastro 38:12
And nothing is happening to Israel. From a Ukrainian point of view, do you feel that football has been used in a political sense as the as Ukraine or as Russia tried to use football for in the conflict?
Francesco Belcastro 38:29
And do you feel there is discrepancy there?
Olga Ruzhelnyk 38:32
Yeah, you see, that's the idea. I'm, I'm, I'm teaching political science too, so I'm kind of like into this one! We cannot compare those two. It's like comparing a cup because it's around and a table because it's white.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 38:51
It's two different things. You know, you cannot compare those two conflict- military conflicts at the time, because if you if you go with just like, Oh, the victim and the attacker, it's too easy. This is not geo- how geopolitics work.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 39:06
So I would not say that we can really compare those two absolutely together. What about like football become to politics when football was not politics. This sport, apolitical sport does not exist. It's, it's just like a dream.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 39:24
I know it's a dream, but it's ...
Francesco Belcastro 39:26
Because otherwise it wouldn't have a podcast anymore. Me and Guy would be...
Olga Ruzhelnyk 39:30
Yeah, it's always politics. It's never outside of politics. And let's say like, they say I'm not political it's not true. Olympic Games is political, always been political. All the football federations or sport federations, they are super much political.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 39:46
And I would say yeah, so it's, it was always political. It just depends. It's really wrong on the path to go and compare or to put on the same thing like, Oh, look, if they done this one, they should be done.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 40:02
You see, this is really, it's really dangerous to go and to label everything as victim, perpetrator and things like this. Geopolitically, it's absolutely different.
Guy Burton 40:14
I just want to say thank you to Olga for the really informative discussion that you've given us. I feel like I've learned quite a lot about not just football in Ukraine, but also the politics of Ukraine and this most recent bit, sort of sport and whether it can be political or not.
Guy Burton 40:32
Thank God it's not political.... Thank God it is political!
Olga Ruzhelnyk 40:34
Yes, it is political!
Guy Burton 40:36
At least we have a podcast!
Olga Ruzhelnyk 40:39
Yeah, so it was my pleasure again, kind of was a struggle bus for me with all this French, English, Ukrainian languages in my head. So I tried to power through it.
Francesco Belcastro 40:52
Before we go, can I ask you one thing? Could you remind our listeners where they can read more of your work? I know a lot is in French, but we've got polyglot [listeners]. They read many languages.
Guy Burton 41:06
So yeah, and we can try and link to it in the show note.
Francesco Belcastro 41:08
Yeah, we'll link to it, but if you could remind us, yeah, if listeners want to be more about your work.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 41:14
Yeah, oh, I have two publications in English, I think it's quite interesting. So the one in review, Political Science Review, quite recent publication, it's about Ukraine. It's pretty sociological as I'm talking about the conversion of the capitals for the football fans throughout their participation in the football movement, then in the revolution and then in war.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 41:41
So how they're kind of the capital and their stand within the society changed throughout that time. Then I had a publication, I think in 2018, it was a Palgrave book on football and politics. Here we are, I had a chapter on Ukraine.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 41:59
It's in English too. It's really more historical vision how football was shaped in Soviet Union and then in independent Ukraine, what really happened, how the movement stabilized and sort of institutionalized within the society.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 42:15
And in French, of course, I have a couple of publications, this publication of "Annexe et deplace." So the football clubs from Crimea and the Donbass area, it was published in 2022. And the really soon in this summer, it will be another publication in Science social du sport.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 42:39
It's the review, French review, but it's going to be in French.
Guy Burton 42:44
Can we ask what else you're working on that might be forth-, you know, upcoming?
Olga Ruzhelnyk 42:51
Yeah, well, I'm working right now in the very interesting project, but it's really French. It's about the, it's all about football. It was just we were doing in the University of Nanterre in my institute, we are creating database of the French movement, sport movement and federation movement.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 43:15
So it's more about this really quantitative research. So I'm not the best one. And I'm trying to work right now to write another article on football fans and really go further with their cap- military capital, the football fans in particular. A lot of them became not just the soldiers, not just the commanders, but really the heroes of the war and the faces of the war.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 43:44
For example, the from the battalion Azov, there's Denys Prokopenko. So this is the the leader of Azov. He was POV, P -P -O -W -P -O -V. During the war, he was liberated first to the Turkey and the Turkey and then afterwards.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 44:01
So he's like the face of Azov. And he was an ultras of Dinamo.
Francesco Belcastro 44:06
Okay.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 44:08
Yeah, so I'm like kind of trying to look at this socio -historical path, biography of the football fans from the pitch to the heroes of war and how those conversion of the capital is happening.
Francesco Belcastro 44:24
When you finish that research, you'll have to come back and tell us a bit more about it. But in the meanwhile, thank you so much for your time, Olga, it's been absolutely fascinating.
Olga Ruzhelnyk 44:33
Thank you.
Francesco Belcastro 44:34
We need to remind something to listeners, right?
Francesco Belcastro 44:36
What do we need to tell listeners, Guy?
Guy Burton 44:38
Well, we need to tell listeners that, as ever, they can find us on various social media, whether it's Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, well, I'm on Twitter, LinkedIn, Francesco doesn't use it, Blue Sky and Instagram.
Guy Burton 44:48
And we would like you to basically just review us. If you like what you hear, share this episode with other people that you know, and consider subscribing on whichever platform you get your podcasts from to get new ones.
Guy Burton 45:00
We always put them out on Mondays, except for obviously, July, August, later part of July and August when we go away on holiday. And we'll be back in September, won't we, Francesco?
Francesco Belcastro 45:10
Another important thing is listeners need to tell us what topics and guests we should talk to. That's very important. Some of the best episodes we've done, in my opinion, have been suggested by listeners on some of the topics.
Guy Burton 45:26
If listeners want to go and listen to some of those episodes, we've looked at football and climate change with Leslie Mabon, that was recommended to us by a listener. We looked at gambling with Steve Menary, that was recommended by a listener.
Guy Burton 45:37
So some of the really interesting topics that we've done have been listener -led, so please keep those suggestions coming in.
Francesco Belcastro 45:46
Uh, yeah, well goodbye. And thanks again!
Guy Burton 45:49
Thanks. Okay, speak to you again then next week, Francesco.