Third Level – Second League, Buffer Zones. Here a few well known names appeared – Soviet champion Zarya (Lugansk – formerly Voroshilovgrad), Soviet Cup winners SKA (Rostov) and Karpaty (Lvov – this club was just restored, so there is problem with historic record: technically, Galichina (Drogobych), which was just renamed and moved away from Lvov SKA-Karpaty, itself amalgamation of SKA and the original Karpaty, should have been inheriting the record and the Cup, but… football had flexible approach to history), some clubs with First Division records in the past, like Daugava (Riga) and Krylya Sovetov (Kuibyshev). Down on their luck for years already, especially SKA (Rostov) – they were unable to keep even third level place presently, finishing the season relegated further down. Apart from the sorry fate of these clubs, the biggest problem was accommodation: the original problem of old Second League was vast difference of quality, generally, a big geographic division between the West and the East. But, geographically, the whole country had to be covered: there were whole Asian republics which could not be ignored, no matter how weak their football was. To this was added the war between Armenia nd Azerbaijan – there was no way their clubs to be placed in the same league, no matter what geography dictated. The military conflict was even used as an original argument for leaving the Soviet championship by the Georgians – they claimed it was not safe for visiting teams to play not only Erevan and Baku, but also in Tbilisi and other Georgian towns, because of the close proximity of the war. The main result of the creation of the Buffer Zones was that they did not solve any problem: the European Zones were still much stronger than the Asian zone. The make up of the zones also created tensions because of the rapidly rising local nationalism – the Ukrainians most certainly preferred to have their own zone, but Zone West, mostly Ukrainian, included also Russian, Latvian, Belarussian, and Armenian teams. Zone Center, which technically should have been only Russian, included the Azerbaijani teams as well, not only increasing travel distances, but bringing the Russian teams dangerously close to active war zone. Zone East was sour spot by definition – it was made by traditionally weak Far East Russian team and weaker still teams from Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and Tadjikistan. The distances in this zone were great and given the low level of the teams, travel even looked just meaningless expense for clubs short of cash to begin with. Corruption was seemingly a normal way of existence over there – nothing became official, but players with experience in the this realm darkly claimed that in Asia the home team wins ever, a fact of life, not of playing. As for the championship, like the 4th level, 3rd level, having the bulk of non-russian teams, was due to disintegration, because of the emerging of independent states. As for the season, it completed.
Zone East – two Uzbek teams finished at the top: Novbahor (Namangan) was 2nd with 58 points, and Neftyanik (Fergana) was champion with 64 points. Promoted to Second Division, which was great success for both teams. At the bottom of the table was also two Uzbek teams – Spartak (Andizhan) was lst with measly 13 points, and Zarafshan (Navoi) was 21st with 33 points. The other two relegated teams were Irtysh (Omsk, Russia), 20th, and Kaysar (just renamed from Meliorator, Kzil-Orda), 19th.
Zone Center – 20 Russian teams and 2 from Azerbaijan. The Azerbaijanis did quite well: Goyazan (Kazakh) ended 11th , Kyapaz (Gyanja) – 5th. Neither was promoted, of course, and perhaps that was best in terms of future complications with separatism. Relegated included Volgar (Astrakhan), last with 22 points, Zarya (Kaluga), 21st,
SKA (Rostov) – just relegated from Second Division, they were going further down to 4th level. 20th in the final table.
And the last relegated was Mashuk (Pyatigorsk), 19th. Up the table were various clubs which eventually became top-tier Russian clubs, but nothing suggested such elevation yet – Sokol (Saratov), Terek (Grozny), to name but two, were still ordinary third level clubs as they were for years. Krylya Sovetov (Kuibyshev) was unable to climb back at least to Second Division once again. They will remain in history as the first Soviet club to import a foreign player, but the Bulgarian veteran defender Tenyo Minchev did not help much in the previous season and was no longer with the team. Krylya Sovetov finished 3rd with 49 points. Tekstilshcik (Kamyshin) was second with 52 points, thus earning promotion. UralMash (Sverdlovsk) won the championship with 59 points – they were climbing back to Second Division, which was their traditional level.
Zone West. Mostly Ukrainian league, completed with few teams from elsewhere. The ‘elsewhere’ made 3 of the 4 relegated teams: Shirak (Leininakan, Armenia) was last, Baltika (Kaliningrad, Russia) was 21st, Iskra (Smolensk, Russia) – 19th, and tucked in 20th place was the only relegated team from Ukraine – Zakarpatye (Uzhgorod). The rest of the ‘elsewhere’ was not impressive, but good for a second season at this new level: Lori (Kirovakan, Armenia) – 18th, Start (Ulyanovsk) – 16th, Khimik (Grodno, Belarus) – 15th, Dnepr (Mogilyov, Belarus) – 13th, Zarya (Beltsy, Moldova) – 11th,
Dinamo (Brest, Belarus) – 9th, and Spartak (Nalchik, Russia) – 8th. The last non-ukrainian club, however, did very well.
From the Ukrainian clubs some were still weak, like Vorskla (Poltava), 12th. The complicated transition of football in Lvov could not excel either – former SKA-Karpaty, now under different name and moved to different city, suffered by relocation, renaming, and lost support from the Soviet Army, for it was a military club in its SKA-Karpaty incarnation. Now it was Galichina (Drogobych), pretty much a new club with new players, and managed to finish only 14th – as SKA-Karpaty, they were just relegated from Second Division. The new or restored Karpaty (Lvov) perhaps was helped by former SKA-Karpaty players joining the club they wanted to play for; by administrators eager to help their ‘real’ club after years of military yoke; by enthusiastic fans, who never accepted and boycotted SKA-Karpaty, but even fueled by nationalism, the club was starting from scratch and was still shaky for better things – Karpaty finished 3rd at the end. Zarya (Lugansk – formerly Voroshilovgrad) was a sorry case similar to that of SKA (Rostov) – they were champions of USSR once upon a time, but after that a slow slump started, which never ended. So, now they were in third level and not very good even there: 7th. Well, at least they were not relegated to 4th level like SKA (Rostov), but recovery of former strength was not in the books either. SKA (Odessa) never played top-league football like Zarya, but Second Division was familiar ground to them – now firmly third-tier, relatively strong for it, but no more – 6th.
Niva (Vinitza) finished 5th confirming again their solid belonging to third level football no matter what kind or reorganizations may happen.
Similar club finished 4th – Niva (Ternopol). That was mostly the regular face of Ukrainian football – many solid third-tier teams, which perhaps could even play Second Division football, but generally making competitive third-level league, to a point preventing each other from promotion and in the same time providing fuel for criticism of the vast level – here they were, strong and competitive, along with some terrible weaklings from the East, having no chance for going up, but at least one of the Asian teams can go up. Anyhow, going up was enjoyed by the top two teams – and here it was again: only one of them was Ukrainian.
Daugava (Riga, Latvia) finished 2nd with 56 points, beating Karpaty (Lvov) by a point. They were just relegated from Second Division, but managed to climb back right away. In, by 1990, very distant past Daugava played top-league football, then plummeted into oblivion. Latvia was hardly fertile football soil, so nothing unusual. Recently, however, Daugava emerged from obscurity, somewhat following the example of the their Lithuanian neighbors. They climbed back to Second Division and played well for awhile, at one point even looking like going to First Division. It was short revival, they were relegated again, but still had strong enough squad and managed to get promotion immediately after relegation. Promotion for the moment, for Latvia was declaring independence.
Bukovina (Chernovtzy) won the championship with 58 points. Well, from Ukrainian standpoint their victory only confirmed the leading position of Ukrainian football. From local standpoint it was a triumph – Bukovina never played Second Division football so far. Everything else is speculation and circumstances: weakened opposition, general turmoil, perhaps having some money to attract better players. This season was great. The future unknown…