Football Club Shakhtar Donetsk is a Ukrainian professional football club from the city of Donetsk. In 2014, due to the War in Donbass, the club was forced to move to Lviv, and had played matches in Lviv (2014–2016) and in Kharkiv (2017–2020) whilst having its office headquarters and training facilities in Kyiv. In May 2020, Shakhtar started to play home matches at NSC Olimpiyskiy in Kyiv.

Shakhtar has appeared in several European competitions and is often a participant in the UEFA Champions League. The club became the first club in independent Ukraine to win the UEFA Cup in 2009, the last year before the competition was revamped as the Europa League. FC Shakhtar Donetsk is one of two Ukrainian clubs, the other being Dynamo Kyiv, who have won a major UEFA competition.

The club formerly played its home matches in Donetsk at the newly built Donbass Arena, however due to the Russo-Ukrainian War in 2014, the team were forced to relocate 1,000 kilometres (620 mi) to the west in Arena Lviv in the interim. Following the winter break of the 2016–17 season the club then moved again to the Metalist Stadium in Kharkiv (250 kilometres (160 mi) to the northwest of Donetsk) early in 2017. In May–July 2020 Shakhtar played home matches at NSC Olimpiyskiy in Kyiv.

Shakhtar Donetsk is one of Ukraine's most popular football clubs, and is particularly favoured in the eastern Donbas region.

The club draws its history from the very start of the Soviet football league competitions and is one of the oldest clubs in Ukraine. The club was a member of the Soviet Voluntary Sports Society of Shakhtyor, having connections with other Soviet teams from Karaganda (Kazakhstan), Soligorsk (Belarus), among others. In the late Soviet period, Shakhtar was considered a tough mid-table club of the Soviet Top League and a cup competition specialist after winning the Soviet Cup two years in a row in 1961 and 1962.

The team has played under the following names: Stakhanovets (1936–46), Shakhtyor (Shakhtar) (1946–92), and FC Shakhtar (1992–present).

Football Club Dynamo Kyiv is a Ukrainian professional football club based in Kyiv. Founded in 1927 as part of the Soviet Dynamo Sports Society, the club plays in the Ukrainian Premier League, and has never been relegated to a lower division.

Since 1936, Dynamo Kyiv has spent its entire history in the top league of Soviet and later Ukrainian football. Its most successful periods are associated with Valeriy Lobanovskyi, who coached the team during three stints, leading them to numerous domestic and European titles. In 1961, the club became first-ever in the history of Soviet football that managed to overcome the total hegemony of Moscow-based clubs in the Soviet Top League. The Spartak Moscow–Dynamo Kyiv rivalry that began in the mid 1970s, is widely considered to have been one of the most exciting football rivalries in the Soviet Union.^[1] Since becoming the first Soviet football club to participate in UEFA competition in 1965, Dynamo Kyiv has played in European competitions almost every season.

Over its history, Dynamo Kyiv have won 16 Ukrainian top-flight league titles, 13 Soviet top-flight league titles, 11 Ukrainian national cup competitions, 9 Soviet national cup competitions, and three continental titles (including two UEFA Cup Winners' Cups). Its two European Cup Winners' Cups make it one of the only two Soviet clubs to have won a UEFA trophy, the other being Dinamo Tbilisi. The Dynamo Kyiv first team became a base team for the Soviet Union national football team in the 1970–1980s and the Ukraine national football team in the 1990–2000s. The two stars on the club's crest each signify 10 top-flight seasons Dynamo Kyiv won.