A little bit about myself: I am a 30 year old software developer who was born and raised in Kiev. My family moved to the U.S. in 1990, and I’ve lived in Boston for the past 10 years. Growing up during Dynamo’s glory days in the 80s, I was fortunate enough to see the club at its peak as it dominated the USSR league and held its own against top European clubs. During the 1990s I lost touch with my hometown team, as the fledgling Ukrainian Premier League was impossible to follow from the U.S. But with the establishment of dedicated cable soccer channels like FSC and GolTV in the early 2000s, and the increasing web presence of world football, I found myself drawn back to the sport and the club I love.

I have been fascinated by the transition of Dynamo from the showpiece of the USSR athletic development program to a true European club made up of players from all over the world. Dynamo used to poach the best Soviet players from other clubs by flexing its political muscle. Today players arrive to Dynamo from far away leagues thanks to hefty transfer fees paid by its oligarch owner. Despite such drastic organizational changes, the constant that connects the past to the present is the club’s style of play, maintained by a coaching staff made up almost entirely of Dynamo stars of the ’70s and ’80s. Dynamo legend Oleg Blokhin once infamously voiced his concern that the globalization of Ukrainian football threatens the team passing game that is the legacy of the club. Having watched Dynamo destroy Spartak Moscow over the two legs of their Champions League qualifying round tie, I am happy to say that a team relying on short passes and movement off the ball can get results and look good doing so, no matter where its players were born.

Lets get to a bit of team news, shall we? While Dynamo used a mostly reserve side to defeat lower league outfit OLKOM Melitopol 0-5 in the Ukrainian Cup round of 32, head coach Yuri Semin traveled with his staff to Blackburn. There he watched Dynamo’s first Champions League opponents, Arsenal, produce an impressive 0-4 victory against the Rovers. Semin will need all of his tactical prowess to prevent Arsenal from coming away with a similar result in Kiev on Wednesday.

That’s it for now, but expect to see much more on this site in the coming days. In addition to covering Dynamo’s matches, I will be writing about the club’s dominant teams and all-time great players. I love to hear from my readers, so please take a second to say hello, and stop by often!