FC Dynamo Moscow

Commemorative coin of Lev Yashin, the legendary goalkeeper of the team.

Dynamo Moscow has its roots in the football Club Sokolniki Moscow.

After the Russian Revolution, the club eventually found itself under the authority of the Interior Ministry and its head Felix Dzerzhinsky, chief of the Cheka, the Soviet Union's secret police. The club was renamed Dynamo Moscow in 1923 but was also referred to disparagingly as "garbage", a Russian criminal slang term for "police", by some of the supporters of other clubs.[11]

Dynamo won the first two Soviet Championships in 1936 and 1937, a Soviet Cup in 1937, and another pair of national titles in 1940 and 1945. In 1945, They were also the first Soviet club to tour the West when they played a series of friendlies in the United Kingdom.[12][13] Complete unknowns to the British, the Soviet players first drew 3–3 against Chelsea and then defeated Cardiff City 10–1. They defeated an Arsenal side reinforced with Stanley Matthews, Stan Mortensen and Joe Bacuzzi by a score of 4–3 in a match played in thick fog at White Hart Lane. They then drew 2–2 against Scottish side Rangers, meaning they completed the tour undefeated.[14]

They continued to be a strong side at home after World War II, and enjoyed their greatest success through the 1950s. Dynamo captured another five championships between 1949 and 1959, as well as their second Soviet Cup in 1953. Honours were harder to come by after that time. The club continued to enjoy some success in the Soviet Cup, but has not won a national championship since 1976. Even so, Dynamo's 11 national titles make them the country's third-most decorated side behind Dynamo Kyiv (13 titles) and Spartak Moscow (12 titles).

Dynamo's greatest achievement in Europe was in the 1971–72 European Cup Winners' Cup, where they reached the Final at Camp Nou in Barcelona, losing 3–2 to Rangers. This was the first time a Russian side had reached a final in a European competition, a feat not repeated until CSKA Moscow won the UEFA Cup in 2005.

Yuri Zhirkov.

Mathieu Valbuena.

At the end of the 2008 season, Dynamo finished third, qualifying for the 2009–10 Champions League preliminary round. On 29 July 2009, Dynamo recorded a 0–1 away win against Celtic at Celtic Park,[15] which gave them a strong advantage going into the second leg. However, Celtic comfortably defeated Dynamo 0–2 in Moscow to progress,[16] sending Dynamo into the Europa League play-off round where the club was eliminated by Bulgarian side CSKA Sofia after a 0–0 away draw in Sofia and a 1–2 home defeat in Moscow.

In 2012, after a poor start to the season in which they lost their first five league games, Dynamo replaced interim manager Dmitri Khokhlov with the Romanian Dan Petrescu, who managed to pull the club out of the relegation zone into a position in the upper-half of the league table. The team was close to qualifying for a place in European competition, but a failure to win in the last matchday left them in seventh, two points below the last Europa League qualifier position. Despite his efforts, Petrescu's contract was terminated on 8 April 2014 by mutual agreement after a heavy loss to league outsiders Anzhi Makhachkala 0–4.[17] As Dynamo Director of Sports Guram Adzhoyev stated, "Last year Dan drew the team from the complicated situation, lifted it to the certain level, but recently we have seen no progress."[18] Petrescu was replaced by Stanislav Cherchesov as manager. Under his management, Dynamo qualified for the group stage of the 2014–15 UEFA Europa League in which they won every game before falling to Napoli in the Round of 16. Dynamo was only able to finish in fourth place in the 2014–15 season after a string of poor results in the latter stages.

In June 2015, Dynamo was excluded from 2015–16 Europa League competition for violating Financial Fair Play break-even requirements.[19][20] As a result, VTB Bank proposed to transfer 74 percent of the shares of the club to the Dynamo sports society. Under the proposed plan, the society would own 100 percent of shares of Dynamo as it did in 2009, while the shares of the VTB Arena would still be held by the Bank. The move would allow the club to comply with the requirements of Financial Fair Play, and VTB Bank would continue to provide support to Dynamo to the extent consistent with Financial Fair Play regulations.

Manager Stanislav Cherchesov was replaced by the returning Andrey Kobelev, and many foreign players, such as Mathieu Valbuena, Balázs Dzsudzsák and Kevin Kurányi, subsequently left Dynamo. Several young Dynamo prospects, such as Grigori Morozov, Aleksandr Tashayev and Anatoli Katrich, who won the Under-21 competition in the 2014–15 season, were introduced to the first-team squad.

On 22 December 2015, Chairman of Dynamo's board of directors Vasili Titov announced that the shares had not been transferred to the Dynamo society; that FFP compliance rather than the share transfer was the top priority for the club; and that he expected the club to achieve compliance by April 2016.[21]

After the winter break of the 2015–16 season, Dynamo won only one game out of 12 played in 2016 and Kobelev was fired with 3 games left in the season. On the final day of the season, Dynamo lost 0–3 to FC Zenit Saint Petersburg at home, dropped to 15th place in the table and was relegated from the Premier League.

In October 2016, with Dynamo leading the second-tier Russian Football National League at the time, the newly appointed club president Yevgeni Muravyov claimed that club's debts stand at 13 billion rubles (approximately 188 million euros) and unless a new owner is found shortly or VTB re-commits to covering the club's debts, the club might declare bankruptcy. That would have most likely meant the loss of professional license and relegation to the fourth-level Russian Amateur Football League.[22]

On 29 December 2016, Dynamo Sports Society agreed to buy VTB Bank shares back for 1 ruble.[7] On 13 January 2017, VTB Bank announced they will sponsor Dynamo Sports Society to the amount of 10.64 billion rubles for the period from 2017 to 2019 (approximately 167 million euros as of that date). HC Dynamo Moscow and other teams of the society were also to be financed under that deal.[23] On 1 February 2017, former club president Boris Rotenberg said that the 75 million euro debt the football club owes to Rotenberg's companies has been restructured and "is not harming anybody".[24] On 12 April 2017, with 7 games left to play in the 2016–17 season, Dynamo secured the return to the top level Russian Premier League for 2017–18. That is the FNL record for the earliest a team secured promotion.[2]

On 14 March 2018, Yevgeni Muravyov was dismissed as the club president due to unauthorized payment made as a "bonus" to a third company during the transfer of Konstantin Rausch from 1. FC Köln.[25]

The new stadium for the club, VTB Arena was completed in late 2018. Following that, the stadium majority owner and football club's major sponsor VTB Bank expressed interest in reacquiring the control over the club. On 14 February 2019, Dynamo Sports Society agreed to sell back the club shares to "Dynamo Management Company" (the company that owns the stadium and has VTB bank as the majority owner).[8] The price was the same symbolic 1 ruble.[9] On 26 April 2019, it was reported that the deal is close to be finalized formally, but the price for the stock increased to 10 billion rubles (approximately €138 million). This reported larger number includes accumulated debts and the cost of the club's training centre.[26] (At the beginning of 2021, the club's chairman Yuri Solovyov said in an interview that Dynamo's debts were about 5.4 billion rubles. The then state of the club Soloviev called "shocking".[27]) On 30 April 2019, VTB confirmed that the deal has been closed and formal price is 1 ruble, the debts outstanding from the football club to Dynamo society has been restructured to an 8-year term, and Yuri Belkin was appointed club's general director.[28]

The 2019–20 season, their first back at the home stadium, started poorly and head coach Dmitri Khokhlov resigned after 12 games played with Dynamo in second-to-last position in the table. Under his replacement, Kirill Novikov, results improved and at the end of the season Dynamo finished 6th. That allowed Dynamo to qualify for European competition (UEFA Europa League) for the first time in 6 seasons.

However, at the end of September 2020, Novikov was dismissed after losing to Locomotive Tbilisi (UEFA qualification) and Khimki (RPL). Sandro Schwarz was appointed as the new coach on 14 October.[29]

In the spring of 2021, the sports press started talking about the "revival" of the Moscow Dynamo. Since the appointment of Sandro Schwarz as coach, the team have won seven victories and four defeats in the Russian Premier League matches. The club's sporting director, Željko Buvač, has already described the start of the season as "great."[30] The team finished the season in 7th place, despite gaining 50 points, which was the most points for Dynamo in the Premier League since the 2014–15 season.

On 24 February 2022, as a consequence of the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, VTB Bank was sanctioned by the United Kingdom.[31] On the same day, VTB Bank transferred the shares of FC Dynamo back to the Dynamo Sports Society.[10]

After the invasion was launched, former Liverpool F.C. and Ukraine striker Andriy Voronin, who had been the team's assistant coach, left the club, writing that he could not work in a country that was bombing his homeland.[32]

The club remained in second place in the 2021–22 Russian Premier League and at competitive points distance from first-place defending champions FC Zenit Saint Petersburg for most of the season before some late Dynamo losses allowed Zenit to secure the title with three games left to play in the season.[33] The club also qualified for the 2021–22 Russian Cup final, their first Russian Cup final appearance since 2012.[34] On the last matchday of the league season on 21 May 2022, Dynamo lost 1–5 at home to PFC Sochi and dropped to 3rd place, letting Sochi overtake them. Still, that was the first Top-3 finish for Dynamo since 2008.[35] On 29 May 2022, Dynamo lost the Russian Cup final to Spartak 1–2, with Daniil Fomin missing a penalty kick deep in added time.[36] Manager Sandro Schwarz resigned from the club after the Cup final.[37]

Slaviša Jokanović was hired as a new manager on 17 June 2022.[38] Several key starting line-up foreign players from the 2021–22 season left the club on loan or suspended their contracts before the season due to the continuing Russian war in Ukraine, including Sebastian Szymański, Nikola Moro, Fabián Balbuena, Ivan Ordets and Guillermo Varela. Dynamo took positions in the upper half of the league table, but below the top 3 during the summer/fall part of the 2022–23 season, not going on any long unbeaten or winless streaks. New Cameroonian signing Moumi Ngamaleu was the only Dynamo player selected for the 2022 FIFA World Cup squads (not counting Szymański and Varela who were loaned out before the season).[39] Dynamo went into the winter break of the season in 4th place.[40] The results continued to be inconsistent after the winter break, and Jokanović was dismissed on 14 May 2023 following a 0–3 home loss to FC Akhmat Grozny, with Dynamo in 7th place.[41] Dynamo lost 5 of the last 7 league games and finished in 9th place.

On 22 June 2023, Marcel Lička was appointed new manager.[42] After losing the opening game of the 2023–24 season, Dynamo went on an unbeaten streak and climbed to 2nd place in the standings by early September.

As of match played 20 March 2014

Season	Round	Competition	Country	Opposing Team	Score	Venue
1972	RU	Cup Winners' Cup		Rangers	2–3	Camp Nou, Barcelona
1978	SF	Cup Winners' Cup		Austria Wien	3–3 on aggregate, 4–5(p)	Two-legged
1985	SF	Cup Winners' Cup		Rapid Wien	2–4 on aggregate	Two-legged

As of 9 July 2021[43]

Rank	Country	Team	Points
147		Heracles Almelo	7.840
148		Dynamo Moscow	7.676
149		Arsenal Tula	7.676

In the 1st half of the 2021–22 season Dynamo recorded the best attendance at home among Moscow football clubs, according to official stats provided by Russian Premier League.[79]

Soviet Top League / Russian Premier League[80]

• Champions (11): 1936 (spring), 1937, 1940, 1945, 1949, 1954, 1955, 1957, 1959, 1963, 1976
• Runners-up (12): 1936 (autumn), 1946, 1947, 1948, 1950, 1956, 1958, 1962, 1967, 1970, 1986, 1994

Soviet Cup / Russian Cup[81][82]

• Winners (7): 1937, 1953, 1966–67, 1970, 1977, 1984, 1994–95
• Runners-up (9): 1945, 1949, 1950, 1955, 1979, 1996–97, 1998–99, 2011–12, 2021–22

Soviet Super Cup / Russian Super Cup

• Winners: 1977
• Runners-up: 1984

Russian Football National League

• Winners: 2016–17

UEFA Cup Winners' Cup

• Runners-up: 1971–72

Ciutat de Barcelona Trophy

• Winners: 1976

Atlantic Cup

• Winners: 2015

Lev Yashin Cup

• Winners: 2010

As of 14 September 2023, according to the RPL official website

Note: Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.

No. Pos. Nation Player 1 GK  RUS Anton Shunin 2 DF  ISR Eli Dasa 3 DF  PAR Fabián Balbuena 4 DF  RUS Sergei Parshivlyuk 5 DF  SRB Milan Majstorović 6 DF  PAR Roberto Fernández 7 MF  RUS Dmitri Skopintsev 8 MF  COL Jorge Carrascal 10 FW  RUS Fyodor Smolov 11 MF  RUS Daniil Lesovoy 13 FW  CMR Moumi Ngamaleu 16 GK  RUS Ivan Budachyov 18 DF  URU Nicolás Marichal 20 FW  RUS Vyacheslav Grulyov 21 MF  RUS Ivan Zazvonkin

No. Pos. Nation Player 22 MF  RUS Igor Shkolik 24 MF  MEX Luis Chávez 31 GK  RUS Igor Leshchuk 34 MF  GEO Luka Gagnidze 50 MF  RUS Aleksandr Kutitsky 59 DF  RUS Ivan Lepsky 70 FW  RUS Konstantin Tyukavin 74 MF  RUS Daniil Fomin 76 GK  RUS Ilya Kuptsov 77 MF  RUS Denis Makarov 80 DF  RUS Stanislav Bessmertny 89 MF  BRA Bitello 91 FW  RUS Yaroslav Gladyshev 93 DF  URU Diego Laxalt

Note: Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.

No. Pos. Nation Player — GK  BLR Andrey Kudravets (at BATE Borisov until 31 December 2023) — DF  UKR Ivan Ordets (at VfL Bochum until 30 June 2024) — MF  RUS Vladislav Galkin (at Akron Tolyatti until 30 June 2024)

No. Pos. Nation Player — MF  RUS Vladislav Karapuzov (at Pari Nizhny Novgorod until 30 June 2024) — MF  RUS Georgy Sulakvelidze (at Samgurali Tsqaltubo until 31 December 2023)

Following Dynamo's relegation from the Russian Premier League (which holds its own competition for the Under-19 teams of the Premier League clubs) at the end of the 2015–16 season, the reserve squad FC Dynamo-2 Moscow received professional license and was registered to play in the third-tier Russian Professional Football League, beginning with the 2016–17 season. Following the main squad's promotion back to the RPL, they stopped playing professionally in the 2017–18 season, with players returning to the RPL U19 tournament. Dynamo-2 returned to PFL for the 2020–21 season.

• 
  Boris Arkadyev
• 
  Mikhail Yakushin
• 
  Konstantin Beskov
• 
  Anatoliy Byshovets
• 
  Valery Gazzaev
• 
  Andrei Kobelev
• 
  Sergei Silkin
• 
  Dan Petrescu
• 
  Dmitri Khokhlov

In the Dynamo organization, the position of "president" has not always been present; several times the head of the club was titled as "chief executive officer (CEO)," or general director.

Nikolai Tolstykh, president of Russian Football Union in 2012–2015. Tolstykh played his entire professional career for Dynamo from 1974 to his retirement in 1983 after a serious injury. After retiring, he served as the team's president and general director on numerous occasions.

Date	Position/name
President
1989–90	Vladimir Pilguy
President
1991–92	Valery Sysoyev
1993–97	Nikolai Tolstykh
General director
1998	Nikolai Tolstykh
President
1999	Nikolai Tolstykh
General director
2000–01	Nikolai Tolstykh
2002	Vladimir Ulyanov
2002–06	Yuri Zavarzin
2006–09	Dmitry Ivanov
President
2009–12	Yury Isayev
2012–13	Gennady Solovyov
2013–15	Boris Rotenberg
Club president
2015–16	Vasily Titov
2016	Vladimir Pronichev
General director
2016–18	Yevgeni Muravyov
2018–19	Sergei Fedorov
2019–21[85]	Yuri Belkin
2021-[86]	Pavel Pivovarov