FC Rostov

Football club infobox
clubname = Rostov


fullname = Football Club Rostov
nickname = "RSM (RostSelMash), Selmashi"
founded = 1930
ground = Olimp - 2, Rostov
capacity = 12,436
chairman = Rustem Alikov
manager = Oleg Dolmatov
league = Russian First League
season = 2007
position = RPL, 16th
pattern_la1=_blueshoulders|pattern_b1=_thinbluesides|pattern_ra1=_blueshoulders
leftarm1=ffff00|body1=ffff00|rightarm1=ffff00|shorts1=ffff00|socks1=ffff00
pattern_la2=_yellowshoulders|pattern_b2=_thinyellowsides|pattern_ra2=_yellowshoulders
leftarm2=5269bd|body2=5269bd|rightarm2=5269bd|shorts2=5269bd|socks2=5269bd

FC Rostov (Russian: Футбольный клуб "Ростов") is a Russian football club, from Rostov-on-Don, in the south of Russia.

Club

Previous names
Traktor (1930-1953)
Torpedo (1953-1957)
Rostselmash (1957-2003)

Achievements
6-th place in Premier Division (1998)

Russian Cup Finalist (2003)

Intertoto Semifinalist (1999)

History of the club

The club was founded in May, 1930 and was known before 1953 as Traktor.

The club, then known as Traktor, started in RSFSR's championship for 3 seasons, starting in 1950.

1950 Club started in championship of RSFSR in South zone of Azov-Don group. The first match was played on May 28th, the last — on September 10th. The club finished the season in 9th place (out of 10).

1951 The championship's rules were changed. In the RSFSR's championship 100 clubs had to play in 8 zones, each divided into 2 groups A and B. Traktor started in group B. By the end of the season it was in first place. The next year Traktor was to play in the group A, where the leader was Dynamo from Rostov.

1952 Traktor was the third in its group, which was led by Dynamo from Rostov and Krasnodar. Next season team started in USSR championship.

Championships of USSR

1953 Club started as Traktor in Class B of USSR championship. In June it got the new name - Torpedo.

The first match was played on May 2nd vs Dynamo from Alma-Ata. It was the first victory - 2:1, Kruglov scored 2 goals.

1958 Club renamed to Rostselmash.The club played in Class B until 1964. That year Rostselmash was first out of 16 in its zone. Then it played in semi-final of zone winners of RSFSR's Class B, where it came in second. And in the final round it was the first by playing the additional match for the first place against Terek Grozny. Rostselmash won that match 2:0 (Yakovenko scored 2). Next season Rostselmash started in the second group of Class A.

1965 Rostselmash played in the 2nd group of the class A for the first time and the season was unlucky. Rostov club finished it in the last, 32nd place. Only because the number of teams for the next season in group had been increased Rostselmash stayed in the class A.

In 1966 some new players were introduced to the club. By the end of the season Rostselmash was in 11th place (out of 17).

1970-1974 During these years Rostselmash did not take part in the USSR championship. It only played in regional tournaments.

1975 After a break Rostselmash returned to USSR championship, which had changed its format. Club started in the 3rd zone of the 2nd League (third highest level). After the first half of the season Rostselmash was in the 3rd place. But by the end of the championship it was in 8th place.

1985 Since the middle of 70's Rostselmash's target was to get into the first league. The club was ready to enter this league - it had had own stadium, own sport-school. The gigantic plant with the same name as the club helped the team. Rostselmash had long traditions - Viktor Ponedelnik, master of the sport, played for Rostselmash. Well-known football players graduated from Rostselmash's sport school, among them Gennadi Matveev, Aleksandr Shevchenko, Veniamin Iskra, Enver Yulgushov, Eduard Yakovenko, Andrian Zhila, Viktor Odintsov, and, in the generation before them, Aleksei Grigoryev, Aleksandr Kazakov, Nikolai Kireyev etc. However, during the next ten years Rostselmash could not reach this target. In some years, the club fell only one point short of reaching the first league.

Rostselmash was the leader in the 3rd zone of the 2nd league, but always came second. The secret is that it was one of the stronger zones in the 2nd League. The clubs that are well-known today played in that zone - Rotor Volgograd, Spartak Ordzhonikidze (now Alaniya), Dynamo Stavropol. In a surprise Rostselmash won the zone in 1985. The main leaders were Terek Grozny and Sokol Saratov. These teams had good players and they represented rich provinces. In the first half of the championship these teams were defeated by Rostselmash, which played away matches. Especially surprising result was in Grozny, where Terek was know for its defence. Rostselmash won that match 5-0.

Rostselmash has gained momentum that year which they did not lose for the whole championship. They went for 26 straight games without a loss. Only in the end of the championship Rostselmash lost the match against Druzhba in Maykop.

The winning of the zone wasn't enough to get into the first league. The tournament of the zone's winners was ahead. The draw was the worst that one can imagine. The opponents were Tavriya from Simferopol - winner of the Ukraine group, the strongest one; Zvezda from Dzhizak - the club which has already played in the first league for several seasons; the winner of the Middle-Asian zone, Sohibkor from Halkabad. Two clubs from Uzbekistan could stand shoulder to shoulder.

The key to success of winning this tournament was first match of Rostselmash vs Zvezda. Not only the result was surprising - Rostselmash had won that match 5:0 - but also the club's game: the players were confident of themselves, in great shape and great athleticism. The next step in the tournament was like the first. Rostselmash had won 5 matches of 6 and got into the first league.

Head coach of Rostselmash V. N. Sinau said after all that: "There were no problems as far as players shape and athleticism go. The players are professionals with good quallification. The most important thing was to let them forget about always coming in second place. We repeated to them almost every day: Enough sight-seeing in the North Caucasus. It is time to fight against more serious clubs such as like Pamir & SKA, Karpati, Nistru & Daugava, Lokomotiv & CSKA."

Rostselmash played attacking football. This tactic played a great role not only in home but also in away matches in spite of the defence of the opponent.

The first league of USSR championship.

1986 The debut of Rostselmash in the first league was successful. The club has been preparing for this in the second league for 11 years. Rostselmash also had some new players transferred from SKA Rostov-na-Donu, who had previously played in the premier league, and that helped as well.

Rostselmash was in the 7th place and scored 86 goals. That was the most goals scored in the league. If the club scored three goals more, then it would have beaten the record set in 1979 by Karpati Lvov. Next few seasons were like running in place. Some leading players left the team, head coach was replaced in 1990.

1991

It was the best season of Rostselmash in USSR championship. The club was in the 4th place. In home matches Rostselmash had no losses and conceded only 5 goals. Rostselmash fought bravely for promotion almost until the very end of the season. That was the last season of USSR championship. The last club's goal in the Soviet period of history was scored on November 5, 1991 by Aleksandr Usaty in Riga, Latvia where Rostselmash defeated Pardaugava 3-0. Three days later, on November 8, the club's last Soviet game was played in St. Petesburg, where Rostselmash, represented with its second team, lost 0-6 to Zenit.

Russian Championships

So, year 1992 The first Russian championship began on March 29th, 1992. Rostselmash was included in group B together with Spartak and Torpedo from Moscow; these clubs had won silver and bronze medals of the last USSR championship; Rotor from Volgograd, the winner of the first league; Asmaral Moscow, managed by Konstantin Beskov; Lokomotiv from Nizhny Novgorod, always hard to play against. Most of Rostselmash's home matches were played at the SKA staium. The club's stadium was being reconstructed, and matches could not have been held at it until autumn. Because of that, Rostselmash has played only the last four home games of the season at its home stadium. Among the games played at SKA was the first match of the season played against Shinnik Yaroslavl. That game was not only the first game for Rostselmash but also the first game of all Russian championships, because of the earlier kick-off time compared to the other cities - 3 pm. The goal which had been scored on the 27th minute of the match by Aleksandr Tikhonov became the first Russian championships goal. That match was the first which Rostselmash had won in the highest league - 2-0. The championship that year was played in two stages - first in 2 groups of 8 teams, and then again in 2 groups of 8 teams (four best from each of the groups from the first stage playing against each other and four worst from the first stage), Rostselmash took 8th place, it would only be higher than that in 1998 and 1999.

1993 This season was the worst for Rostselmash in all of its Russian history. One of the reasons was that there had not been enough good players. During the first half of the season several players left the club - Klyuchnikov went to Finland, Balakhnin and Styopushkin went to Israel, Kovtun left for the Dynamo Moscow. The best forward A. Tikhonov was injured. It was impossible to find players who could replace them. But in the second half Andreyev, Parovin and Tatarkin returned and helped the club.For the first 11 games of the second half Rostselmash was on the same level as its opponents, but the most important matches were the two last games of the championship in Moscow against Spartak and Dynamo. Rostselmash did not take any points in those matches. Rostselmash and Ocean had the same number of points, but Rostov club had fewer wins. So, it had to start in the first league for the next year.

1994 History was told by the head coach of Rostselmash of 1994 Enver Yulgushov.

What was hard in the season? When in spring we were gathering information about our opponents we had not believed in our success. Zenit from St. Petesburg was the main club which had been counted as one of two teams to win this championship. Besides, Chernomorets from Novorossiisk — with Oleg Dolmatov as head coach — was showing good footbal and have already knocked at the door of the highest league. The good team was in Saratov — Sokol. Also Asmaral from Moscow, Luch and Ocean from Far East. Baltika, which was one of the pretenders on the highest league during season, had not been counted such before season.We had a lot of losts in the club. But the main loss was our goalkeeper Evgeny Krukov, who had helped a lot. We did not wait for that he would choose another club. We were searching for another good goalkeeper until the second round. Then we baught Evgeny Kurnukhin. We had one more problem. Football championship is not only the competition of the clubs but also of the biggest cities. Two port-cities were standing for Chernomorets and Baltika, the aviation gigantiv plant was standing for Saratov. Our samenamed plant Rostselmash refused to help us because of the own problems.The club had reached its target. The monument should be put on the stadium to the players. The fought in spite of all problems. We had no pessimists in the team. The main slogan was: Football — first of all, other things would be later. I think it wasn’t occasionally that such players as Andrey Redkin, Sergey Dementev, Mikhail Kupriyanov from Moscow, Vitaliy Papadopulo, Alexander Vorobjev had come to our club.I heard that some people were saing that Rostselmash hadn’t wanted to get into the highest league, that in club there had been a lot of old players, who didn’t want to play in highest league. But this old playears were the main force to get into the highest league.During last two seasons Rostselmash fount its game, partners understood each other, the game was with elements of force. This game we shall show next season as our visiting card together with Alexander Maslov, Dmitriy Loskov, Andrey Redkin. But also the old players can make a lot.We, trainers, had October as double, the 13-th month of the year. The race together with Baltika needed a lot of physics and moral forces. Also we had to think about future. It was clear, the we had to strength two or three points on the playing field. But what players did we need? Did we need players of the first or the highest league? So, the administration of the club had no time for the rest. Thanks to the God, that everything overed successfully — we had reached the tops of the Russian football!

1995

Rostov club had to search for new players again. Nobody afraid of the well-known players in the highest league. Club got new goalkeeper, who had played for the national team of Georgia — Akakiy Devadze. Ulgushov invited three new defenders, who had played in the highest league before. The are Golubkin from Tolyatti he had played in Rostselmash earlier, Eshenko from Volgograd and player of the Spartak Moscoe Ananko club rented him. Sergey Andreev who had been the captain of Rostselmash changed his title for head coach. The club was on the 14-th place of the 16-th. It was with new and young coach.

1996

Alexey Gerasimenko, Gradilenko, Vladislav Prudius have entered the club this year. The season was rather lucky. Alexander Maslov beacme the best forward of the championship.

1997

This season was the year of coming new well-known players. Igor Khankeev, Vladimir Savchenko, Mikhail Kupriyanov and Oleg Pestryakov has entered the club. But the club lost such players as D. Loskov, A. Devadze, Ageev. Durin all the season Rostselmash was in the middle of the championship’s table.In this year Rostselmash was scored the 200 goal. The most beautiful match was in Rostov-na-Donu against Spartak Moscow which Rostselmash had lost 3:5. After the score had been 1:4 it became 3:4. Only on the last minute Spartak scored the 5-th goal.

1998

This season was the best of all Russian championships for Rostselmash. By the end of it the club had been on the 6-th place. And also were new players — Sergey Kolotovkin, Anatoliy Bessmertniy, Dmitriy Kirichenko. Alexey Gerasimenko have left Rostselmash for Dynamo Kiev. The first time of all its history Rostselmash got the right to play in Euro Cups — for beginning in Intertoto Cup.

1999

This season will be remembered for the long time — Rostov-na-Donu has been visited by Juventus Turin, Italy. Rostselmash couldn’t defeat this club of corse, but the club had gotten great thanks. For 3 months team played matches on every 3-rd day. Everybody knews such results of playing in Intertoto Cup — Uralmash, Tekstilshik, KamAZ has left the highest division after it. But Rostselmash had been on the 7-th place by the end of the championship only five cluns from Moscow and Alania from Vladikavkaz were ahead. Even Rotor Volgograd and Torpedo Moscow couldn’t reach such results after Intertoto Cup.

2000

Only 6 wins, the 12-th position in tournament table and Sergey Andreev’s left – this is the result of the season, which brought only regret. FC Rostselmash participated in UEFA Intertoto Cup for the second time and failed to pass through AJ Auxerre from France.

2001

The debut of Sergei Balakhnin wasn’t lucky. Anatoly Baydachny, who came on his place, also didn’t reach much. The white spot in FC Rostselmash was Dmitry Kirichenko, who scored 13 goals. But he left for PSC CSKA after this season.

2002

The season should be interesting. The administration put the task to get the medals. But the first circle showed than team has a lot of problems. As the result FC Rostselmash got finance and moral crisis. The gubernator of Rostov Region Vladimir Chub advised Ivan Savvidi to lead the club. After change of leaders the situation became better. The club had no more financial problems, got two new strong legionaries, returned Alexandr Maslov to team. Sergei Balakhnin became the head coach again. The result of the season stayed in the league, but wasn’t higher than 12 position for the first time during last 3 seasons.

2003

In 2003 club was renamed in honour of its city and got their best achievement in Russia. In Russian Cup they played in the Final, where they played equal with 9-time Russian champion Spartak Moscow. Rostov lost 0-1, but one week later they won in championship game vs Spartak 3-2 proved they had the ability to win Cup. On December 9, 2003 Balakhnin was sacked. Vitaliy Shevchenko took his place.

2004

Club started this season with bad results. Rostov lost 0-4 its starting championship match against Torpedo on the home ground. This match was followed by a series of games without a single win. As a result, when on April 14, 2004 Rostov lost 0-3 the Russian Cup game to Torpedo-Metallurg, Shevchenko resigned. Two days later club chairman Ivan Savvidi again appointed Balakhnin as head coach. Club has occupied 12 places showing bad play, what antipathy to rooters. All were not a complacent president a club. On December 30, 2004 Sergey Balakhnin was sacked again and replaced by Gennady Stepushkin, a former Rostselmash defender.

2005

Again, the club's start in the championship was very poor. In the first 5 games, FC Rostov got only one point. On April 18, 2005 the club's official website stated that Stepushkin was ill and would be temporarily replaced with Paul Ashworth, director of sport of the club. In July 2005 Ashworth moved to coach Skonto Riga and was replaced by Valeri Petrakov who coached FC Moskva before that. In the first four games under Petrakov Rostov took only one point, and he was fired and replaced by Sergei Balakhnin, who will have his fourth stint as a head coach of the club. Some days later, Ivan Savvidi also resigned as the president.In the middle of the season it seemed that nothing could save FC Rostov from relegation, but after these changes the club's performance improved dramatically. The club signed some good players, who, especially striker Maksim Buznikin, helped the club to get 19 points in 11 games and to stay away from relegation. Buznikin, who scored 8 goals in 10 games, was voted player of the year by Rostov supporters.

2007

This season was a disaster for the club. With only 2 wins, the club was at the last, 16th place most of the season and was relegated from the Premier League.

2008

According to the official website, the season's goal is returning to the Premier League. Michail Osinov promissed to put all efforts to accomplish this task because "it is much more pleasurable to play in the Premier Division than in the First Division".The club is currently on course back to promotion , midway thrue the season undefeated in 21 games so far.

League results

ImageSize = width:600 height:60PlotArea = left:10 right:10 bottom:30 top:10TimeAxis = orientation:horizontal format:yyyyDateFormat = dd/mm/yyyyPeriod = from:01/01/1991 till:01/07/2008ScaleMajor = unit:year increment:1 start:1992 Colors = id:bl1 value:rgb(0.5,0.8,0.5) id:bl2 value:rgb(0.9,0.9,0.3) id:rs value:rgb(0.8,0.6,0.6) id:rn value:rgb(0.9,0.1,0.1)

PlotData= bar:Position width:15 color:white align:center

from:01/07/1991 till:01/07/1992 shift:(0,-4) text:8 from:01/07/1992 till:01/07/1993 shift:(0,-4) text:17 from:01/07/1993 till:01/07/1994 shift:(0,-4) text:2 from:01/07/1994 till:01/07/1995 shift:(0,-4) text:11 from:01/07/1995 till:01/07/1996 shift:(0,-4) text:14 from:01/07/1996 till:01/07/1997 shift:(0,-4) text:13 from:01/07/1997 till:01/07/1998 shift:(0,-4) text:6 from:01/07/1998 till:01/07/1999 shift:(0,-4) text:7 from:01/07/1999 till:01/07/2000 shift:(0,-4) text:12 from:01/07/2000 till:01/07/2001 shift:(0,-4) text:12 from:01/07/2001 till:01/07/2002 shift:(0,-4) text:11 from:01/07/2002 till:01/07/2003 shift:(0,-4) text:11 from:01/07/2003 till:01/07/2004 shift:(0,-4) text:12 from:01/07/2004 till:01/07/2005 shift:(0,-4) text:13 from:01/07/2005 till:01/07/2006 shift:(0,-4) text:12 from:01/07/2006 till:01/07/2007 shift:(0,-4) text:16

from:01/07/1991 till:01/07/1993 color:bl1 shift:(0,13) text: "RPL" from:01/07/1993 till:01/07/1994 color:bl2 shift:(0,13) text: "D1" from:01/07/1994 till:01/07/2007 color:bl1 shift:(0,13) text: "RPL" from:01/07/2007 till:01/07/2008 color:bl2 shift:(0,13) text: "D1"

Current squad

Notable past players

;Russia
* Roman Adamov
* Dimitri Ananko
* Maksim Buznikin
* Andrei Chichkin
* Maksim Demenko
* Andrei Fedkov
* Dmitri Kirichenko
* Sergei Kolotovkin
* Yuri Kovtun
* Dmitri Loskov
* Aleksandr Maslov
* Nikolai Olenikov
* Aleksandr Shmarko
* Ivan Starkov;Belarus
* Timofei Kalachev
* Vladimir Korytko
* Sergei Omelyanchuk
* Gennady Tumilovich;Brazil
* Rafael Akai
* Alberto;Czech Republic
* Martin Horák;Georgia
* Rati Aleksidze
* Mikheil Ashvetia
* Otar Khizaneishvili;Ghana
* Baba Adamu;Kazakhstan
* Andrei Karpovich
* Samat Smakov;Latvia
* Aleksandrs Koļinko
* Juris Laizāns
* Vīts Rimkus;Lithuania
* Robertas Poškus;Malawi
* Essau Kanyenda;Montenegro
* Jovan Tanasijević;Morocco
* Abdelillah Bagui;Serbia
* Ivica Kralj
* Albert Nađ
* Mihajlo Pjanović
* Milan Vještica;Saint Vincent and the Grenadines
* Wesley Charles;South Africa
* Matthew Booth
* Bennett Mnguni
* Japhet Zwane;Ukraine
* Maksym Biletskyi
* Yuri Maximov
* Valentyn Slyusar;Uruguay
* Omar Pérez
* Bruno Silva;Uzbekistan
* Andrey Akopyants

External links

*ru icon [http://www.fc-rostov.ru/ Official website]
*ru icon [http://www.maniacs.far.ru/ Guestbook fans - Rostov Network Maniacs]
*ru icon [http://www.wildlegion.ru/ Rostov Football hoolligans]
* [http://eng.russ-yug.ru/theme/42/ News on Rostov Football club]