AFP, Kiev :
Ukrainian football bosses have cut the country’s top flight to 14 teams next season as the ongoing conflict in the country has hit some of the top Premiership clubs.
“The situation in the country and within the country’s football is very complicated,” Ukraine’s Football Federation (FFU) chief Anatoly Konkov told a press conference on Friday.
“We were hoping to the bitter end that Sevastopol and Stal Alchevsk would be able to play in the Premiership next season but they withdrew for various reasons leaving us no alternative but to reduce the league to 14 teams.
“But we (FFU) are ready for any surprises. Football in Ukraine is not dead. There are certain difficulties but we will surely overcome all of them.”
Last season Arsenal Kiev withdraw from the 16-team championship midway through the season because of financial difficulties. Another top flight club Sevastopol were disbanded at season’s end after owner Vadim Novinksy pulled the plug on the Crimean- based outfit.
Novinsky, who had previously expressed his intention to change the club’s location to stay in the Ukrainian league after the Black Sea peninsula was annexed by Russia, later opted to totally withdraw his funding.
Meanwhile, Stal Alchevsk, who won promotion last season, ruled out top flight football because of financial difficulties. The military conflict between pro-Russian rebels and government troops have forced clubs from the southeastern cities of Donetsk and Lugansk to seek new venues for domestic and European games.
Champions Shakhtar Donetsk have chosen Kiev as their new base, and will likely play their league home matches at regional centre Cherkassy, 160km from the capital.
Nine-time champions Shakhtar are still considering which venue to chose for Champions League matches, having either the arena at Lviv, built for Euro-2012 matches, or the Central stadium of Bucharest, the home town of their Romanian manager Mircea Lucescu, as their options.
