Chornomorets (Odesa), the former grand master of Ukrainian soccer, has fallen out of the first league. Head coach Leonid Buriak is off of the team.
Volodymyr Akhabadze, director of the Chornomorets soccer club, says, “Late on June 2, when Leonid Buriak was out of the city for the Spartak and Dynamo game of the stars, three men came to the Chornomorets base in an Odesa suburb and handed over documents, according to which the oblast council was the club owner and Leonid Buriak was suspended from his post. The newcomers do not want to negotiate with us and say they will establish a new super-club from the very beginning. By now I did not sign Buriak’s resignation because there was none. Buriak remains also club’s cofounder with a 1% share.”
Leonid Buriak, Chornomorets former head coach, adds, “There is a main reason for my resignation. I was forced to deal with the financial problems of the club in addition to coaching. I got tired of trying to get bring the attention of the city fathers and potential sponsors to the club’s problems. But the number of unsolved questions did not decrease and if you take into account staff problems, you cannot demand much from the team under such conditions.”
Hryhory Surkis, the president of Professional Soccer League of Ukraine, states, “Unfortunately, the management of Chornomorets did not inform the PSL on the arguments inside and about the team on time. As a result Odesa lost its representative in the senior league, which means damage was caused to Ukrainian soccer.
I am sure that the team will manage to make it back to the Ukrainian soccer elite if there are people willing to invest money in it without caring about profit. It does not matter who owns the club’s seal. The point is who will take responsibility for the club’s future.”
As we see, an authoritative soccer club turned out to be in limbo. And it will take much effort to make a comeback. Will the right conclusions be made?






