Narodnyy Klub Veres Rivne () is a Ukrainian professional football club based in Rivne. The club competes in the Ukrainian Premier League, the top tier of Ukrainian football, after winning the 2020–21 Ukrainian First League. Their home stadium until 2017 was Avanhard Stadium in Rivne. From that time, till September 2022 the club played its home matches at Avanhard Stadium in Lutsk. Since September 2022, all home matches are played in partially renovated Avanhard Stadium.
Founded in 1957, Veres first promoted to Ukrainian Premier League in 1992, and spent there 5 seasons in total over three periods. They achieved their best result of 6th place in 2017–18 season. Veres also reached the semi-finals of 1993–94 Ukrainian Cup.
The team ran into financial difficulties after the winter break of the 2010–11 season and was removed from the Ukrainian Second League.Expelled from the PFL due to their financial situation. (April 29, 2011) It was reinstated and resumed playing in the same league in 2015. The home uniform consists of red shirt with black shorts; the away uniform is all black.
History Soviet times
The team was founded in 1957 as Kolhospnyk (collective farm worker) and played the 1958 season in the Class B Third Zone, finishing 14th of the 16 teams that participated. The team played 13 seasons in Class B. The best results came in the 1968 and 1969 seasons when the team placed 7th. In 1966, it changed its name to Horyn after the river that flows in Volhynia.
After the reorganization of the Championship of the USSR in 1971, Horyn played in the Second League of the Ukrainian Zone until the fall of the Soviet Union. In 1972, the club became part of the all-Ukrainian Avanhard voluntary sports society and changed its name to Avanhard. In the first season in the Second League of the Ukrainian Zone Avanhard placed 26th. Starting in the late 1970s Avangard started progressing and in 1981 under the management of two famous Dynamo Kyiv players Viktor Matvienko and Volodymyr Troshkin Avanhard got 3rd place. Nine years later under the management of Viktor Pokora Avanhard placed 3rd again.
Three seasons in Vyshcha Liha During the fall of the Soviet Union it changed its name again to Veres (heather) and was placed in the 1992 Ukrainian First League. In the same season, Veres placed first and was promoted to the Vyshcha Liha. In their first season in Vyshcha, Veres placed last but wasn't relegated because the league was expanded. The following season was the most successful in the club's history. The team was 4th at the mid-way point, beating teams like FC Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk, FC Metalist Kharkiv, FC Shakhtar Donetsk, defeating FC Dynamo Kyiv in the Ukrainian Cup to reach the semi-final. But during the second half, Veres fell to 12th place. During the 1994–95 season, their second in the Premier League, Veres struggled and was relegated to the Ukrainian Second League.
Liquidation in 2011 After relegation from the Ukrainian First League, Veres remained in the Second League until 2011 when, after 54 years as a professional football club, Veres declared bankruptcy and was liquidated.
The huge People's Club project On 19 March 2015, the club was reinstated as Public Union Rivne Football Club Veres Rivne by two Ukrainian public organizations "Rivne City Football Federation" and "Rivne Oblast Football Federation". The chairman of the Public Union became a well known businessman of Rivne Oblast Oleksiy Khakhlyov, a son-in-law of former President of Ukraine Viktor YushchenkoHow the "people's" football club "Veres" was transferred under control of a Lviv businessman (Як «народний» футбольний клуб «Верес» перейшов під контроль львівського бізнесмена). Chetverta Vlada. 8 June 2016 (check also FC Nafkom Brovary). It was the first club in Ukraine to have club membership among its fans and as of May 21 had over 3,500 members (3,728 in 2016). Khakhlyov initiated a powerful promotion campaign in social media such as Facebook ("the 12th player") to reflect popularity of the newly created club. The club was announced as "PEOPLE's" (Narodnyi). During the campaign members of the new club claimed that the club accepts no outsiders, only Rivne natives. About that fact even commented one of Ukrainian football journalist Artur Valerko complementing it as appealing, interesting, and seems like a "policy of Athletic Bilbao". The club's statute also stated that no one unrelated to Rivne Oblast may sponsor or in any way participate in the club. The idea of people's club is not new and previously for propaganda was used when FC Prykarpattia Ivano-Frankivsk transformed into FC Spartak Ivano-Frankivsk back in 2003 as People's Football Club Spartak Ivano-Frankivsk (NFK Spartak Ivano-Frankivsk).
In the 2015–16 Ukrainian Second League season, Veres finished in second place and was promoted to the Ukrainian First League. The promotion was widely celebrated at the Rivne city central square (Maidan Nezalezhnosti). Following the success Khakhlyov came out and announced, "I appeared in front of perspective that "Veres" wants to play in the First League, but there are no money. Membership contributions, help of the budget and sponsors are not enough. We gathered, conditionally speaking, 5 million, but need 15. Why 15? It is a simple thing. I cannot live without a dream. The dream was not only revive "Veres", but to get promoted to the First League. They were looking at me as on an idiot. Now I have a dream that "Veres" in the Premier League, Veres among elites of Ukrainian football. We will be realizing it".
After the end of the 2015–16 Ukrainian Second League season, the club was reconstituted as a limited liability company TOV FC Veres-Rivne by the Public Union "Rivne Football Club Veres Rivne" and Lviv Refrigerating Company "Limo", with the latter becoming the majority holder with a 61% stake. (Note: TOV is a Ukrainian acronym for limited liability company (, tovarystvo z obmezhenoiu vidpovidalnistiu).) The Veres-Rivne company headed by Ihor Dedyshyn was founded to manage the club. Previously Dedyshyn was a sports journalist, football manager of FC Karpaty Lviv, and a manager of Lviv media company "ZIK". "Limo" whose final beneficiary is Bohdan Kopytko will cover the budget costs of approximately ₴15 million for the 2016–17 Ukrainian First League season. The goal for the season was to achieve promotion to the Ukrainian Premier League. The club FC Veres-Rivne received certification (attestation) to play in the PFL competitions from the Football Federation of Ukraine signed by O.Bandurko and Yu.Zapisotskyi (acting head of the FFU committee on licensing of clubs).
Following the reorganization from People's Club (NK) Veres Rivne to FC Veres-Rivne, the Rivne internet newspaper "Chetverta Vlada" called for explanation to Oleksiy Khakhlyov, whether the club is still "People's". Khakhlyov answered that the club was "People's", is "People's", and will be "People's". He then added, "the Public Union which had a certification as a professional club to play football in the 2015–16 Ukrainian Second League. There are property terms. In regards to special requirements to the teams that play in professional sports, there are certain requirements in regards to certification of professional clubs. It cannot be a "Public Union", because our "Public Union" a priory is a non-profit organization".
In the beginning of March 2017 the supervisory board of NK Veres Rivne announced that will not hold meeting as the club's leadership failed to submit the club's financial report for 2016.Scandal in FC Veres: why the supervisory board is in conflict with its leadership (Скандал у футбольному клубі «Верес»: чому конфліктує наглядова рада і керівництво). Chetverta Vlada. 6 March 2017 The supervisory board that was created in May 2015 was set up with controlling functions of the club, but has been ignored by the club's leadership.
2017: Desna vs Veres promotion scandal On 1 June 2017, it was announced that second-place club FC Desna Chernihiv was denied a license to play in the top division. The argument was that the club was not able to provide guarantees for adequate financing of infrastructure.Veres passed an attestation and will be playing in the UPL along with a coach Kvartsianyi (Верес получил аттестат и сыграет в УПЛ с тренером Кварцяным). Sport Arena. 1 June 2017 The license was granted to NK Veres Rivne, the third-place team during the previous season in the second division.As a result, Veres was promoted to the first division instead of Vesna (Десну не пустили в УПЛ, из Первой лиги выйдет Верес). Football.ua. 1 June 2017
Both clubs, FC Desna Chernihiv and NK Veres Rivne, had not played at their home stadiums in the 2016–17 Ukrainian First League. Desna had played in Kyiv at the Obolon Arena, while Veres played in Varash, at the Izotop Stadium of the Rivne Nuclear Power Plant. The administration of Desna released a letter of protest before a meeting of FFU representatives.Desna's administration: if there won't be the Premier Liha, there won't be financing (Руководство Десны: не будет Премьер-лиги — не будет финансирования). Football.ua. 1 June 2017 In protest, the Desna administration announced that the club would not play its final game of the season against FC Illichivets Mariupol, but later relented.The Illichivets-Desna game was to take place after all(Матч Ильичевец - Десна состоится). UA-Football. 2 June 2017 Nonetheless, during the game, players of both teams protested on the field in a special way: when the whistle was blown the players, instead of starting play, stood around kicking a ball back and forth among themselves.The Illichivets-Desna game started with a protest of players (Матч Ильичевец - Десна начался с акции протеста футболистов). UA-Football. 4 June 2017
On 2 June 2017, upon conclusion of its conference, the UPL administration announced the final composition of the league and calendar for the upcoming season. The conference confirmed the admission of Veres to the league, with only one vote against, from FC Dynamo Kyiv; six votes in favour of the decision; and three (including FC Zorya Luhansk) abstentions.Rafailov: I would like that UPL was forming based exclusively on a sports principles (Рафаилов: Хотелось бы, чтобы УПЛ формировалась исключительно по спортивному принципу). UA-Football. 7 June 2017 On 2 June 2017, the Desna fans were picketing the House of Football in Kyiv after they arrived on four buses from Chernihiv."500 thousands for a place in the UPL?!" How the Desna fans were picketing FFU and UPL ("500 тисяч за місце в УПЛ?!" Як фанати Десни пікетували ФФУ та УПЛ). Football24.ua. 2 June 2017
On 7 June 2017, sports media UA-Football requested permission from Football Federation of Ukraine and FC Desna Chernihiv to publish related documents to clarify the situation and come to some kind of closure.Open letter of the UA-Football site administration to the Football Federation of Ukraine and FC Desna (Открытое письмо редакции сайта UA-Футбол к ФФУ и ФК Десна). UA-Football. 7 June 2017