The award Soviet Footballer of the Year was awarded to the best footballer of the Soviet Union from 1964 until 1991. The poll was conducted among journalists by the weekly sports newspaper Football (Football-Hockey). Each journalist named his own top three players every year. Each place carried a point weight such as 1st place was worth 3 pts., 2nd - 2, and 3rd - 1.
The idea for the award appeared right after Lev Yashin had received the Ballon d'Or award in 1963.Самые титулованные футболисты, чаще всего получавшие премию футболист года, за всю историю чемпионата СССР. dzen.ru. 3 July 2019 The honours were awarded along with several other prizes and awards at the end of the competition season. For goalkeepers, not limited to the Soviet Footballer of the Year, also were awarded separate honours, the "Best Goalkeeper of the Year". The best goal-scorer of the Soviet Top League was awarded with the "Best Topscorer of the Year". Before becoming an official award in 1964, in the 1950s Moskovskij Komsomolets and Komsomolskaya Pravda were conducting their own polls to honour the best footballer of the country.
List of winners
Year Place Player Club Points Notes19641st Valery VoroninTorpedo Moscow 2nd Valentin IvanovTorpedo Moscow 3rd Slava MetreveliDinamo Tbilisi 19651st Valery VoroninTorpedo Moscow Only the winners were announced; it was later established that Streltsov finished 2nd.2nd Eduard StreltsovTorpedo Moscow 19661st Andriy BibaDynamo Kyiv Yashin and Shesternev obtained an equal number points, but Yashin was ranked higher for having more 1st place votes.2nd Lev YashinDynamo Moscow 3rd Albert ShesternevCSKA Moscow 19671st Eduard StreltsovTorpedo Moscow 2nd Murtaz KhurtsilavaDinamo Tbilisi 3rd Anatoliy ByshovetsDynamo Kyiv 19681st Eduard StreltsovTorpedo Moscow 2nd Murtaz KhurtsilavaDinamo Tbilisi 3rd Albert ShesternevCSKA Moscow 19691st Vladimir MuntyanDynamo Kyiv 2nd Anzor KavazashviliSpartak Moscow 3rd Albert ShesternevCSKA Moscow 19701st Albert ShesternyovCSKA Moscow 2nd Vladimir FedotovCSKA Moscow 3rd Viktor BannikovDynamo Kyiv 19711st Evhen RudakovDynamo Kyiv 2nd Viktor KolotovDynamo Kyiv 3rd Eduard MarkarovArarat Yerevan 19721st Yevgeny LovchevSpartak Moscow 2nd Evhen RudakovDynamo Kyiv 3rd Murtaz KhurtsilavaDinamo Tbilisi 19731st Oleg BlokhinDynamo Kyiv 2nd Arkady AndriasyanArarat Yerevan 3rd Vladimir PilguyDynamo Moscow 19741st Oleg BlokhinDynamo Kyiv 2nd Vladimir VeremeevDynamo Kyiv 3rd Aleksandr ProkhorovSpartak Moscow 19751st Oleg BlokhinDynamo Kyiv 2nd Vladimir VeremeevDynamo Kyiv 3rd Yevgeni LovchevSpartak Moscow 19761st Vladimir AstapovskiyCSKA Moscow 2nd David KipianiDinamo Tbilisi 3rd Oleg BlokhinDynamo Kyiv 19771st David KipianiDinamo Tbilisi 2nd Oleg BlokhinDynamo Kyiv 3rd Yuriy DehteryovShakhter Donetsk 19781st Ramaz ShengeliaDinamo Tbilisi 2nd Oleg BlokhinDynamo Kyiv 3rd Georgi YartsevSpartak Moscow 19791st Vitali StarukhinShakhter Donetsk 2nd Vagiz KhidiyatullinSpartak Moscow 3rd Yuri GavrilovSpartak Moscow 19801st Aleksandr ChivadzeDinamo Tbilisi 2nd Oleg BlokhinDynamo Kyiv 3rd Vagiz KhidiyatullinSpartak Moscow 19811st Ramaz ShengeliaDinamo Tbilisi 2nd Oleg BlokhinDynamo Kyiv 3rd Leonid BuryakDynamo Kyiv 19821st Rinat DasaevSpartak Moscow 2nd Anatoliy DemyanenkoDynamo Kyiv 3rd Andrei YakubikPakhtakor Tashkent 19831st Fyodor CherenkovSpartak Moscow 2nd Rinat DasaevSpartak Moscow 3rd Aleksandr ChivadzeDinamo Tbilisi 19841st Hennadiy LitovchenkoDnipro Dnipropetrovsk 2nd Mikhail BiryukovFC Zenit Leningrad 3rd Yuri GavrilovSpartak Moscow 19851st Anatoliy DemyanenkoDynamo Kyiv 2nd Oleg ProtasovDnipro Dnipropetrovsk 3rd Fyodor CherenkovSpartak Moscow 19861st Aleksandr ZavarovDynamo Kyiv In 1986 Igor Belanov won the Ballon d'Or but could not become the best player in the Soviet Union.2nd Igor BelanovDynamo Kyiv 3rd Oleg BlokhinDynamo Kyiv 19871st Oleg ProtasovDnipro Dnipropetrovsk 2nd Alexei MikhailichenkoDynamo Kyiv 3rd Rinat DasaevSpartak Moscow 19881st Alexei MikhailichenkoDynamo Kyiv 2nd Rinat DasaevSpartak Moscow 3rd Fyodor CherenkovSpartak Moscow 19891st Fyodor CherenkovSpartak Moscow 2nd Stanislav CherchesovSpartak Moscow 3rd Vladimir BessonovDynamo Kyiv 19901st Igor DobrovolskiDynamo Moscow 2nd Sergei YuranDynamo Kyiv 3rd Aleksandr MostovoiSpartak Moscow 19911st Igor KolyvanovDynamo Moscow 2nd Aleksandr MostovoiSpartak Moscow 3rd Igor KorneevCSKA Moscow
Most wins by club
Club Winners Winning yearsDynamo Kyiv 1966, 1969, 1971, 1973, 1974, 1975, 1985, 1986, 1988Dynamo Tbilisi 1977, 1978, 1980, 1981Spartak Moscow 1972, 1982, 1983, 1989Torpedo Moscow 1964, 1965, 1967, 1968CSKA Moscow 1970, 1976Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk 1984, 1987FC Dynamo Moscow 1990, 1991Shakhter Donetsk 1979
Most wins by player
Name Wins Winning yearsOleg Blokhin 1973, 1974, 1975Fyodor Cherenkov 1983, 1989Ramaz Shengelia 1978, 1981Eduard Streltsov 1967, 1968Valery Voronin 1964, 1965
See also After the Soviet Union dissolved most of the new independent countries created their own awards to the best footballer of the year. A few countries including Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania had been awarding their own awards even before the collapse of Soviet Union. Armenian Footballer of the Year Azerbaijani Footballer of the Year Belarusian Footballer of the Year Estonian Footballer of the Year Georgian Footballer of the Year Kazakhstani Footballer of the Year Latvian Footballer of the Year Lithuanian Footballer of the Year Moldovan Footballer of the Year Footballer of the Year in Russia (Futbol) Footballer of the Year in Russia (Sport-Express) Ukrainian Footballer of the Year Uzbekistan Footballer of the Year Footballer of the Year in Baltic and Commonwealth of Independent States
References