Polissya Zhytomyr

Full name	Football Club Polissya Zhytomyr
Founded	1959; 66 years ago (1959) (asAvanhard Zhytomyr) 2016 (asMFC Zhytomyr)
Ground	Tsentralnyi Stadion,Zhytomyr
Capacity	5,928
Owner	Hennadiy Butkevych
General Director	Volodymyr Zahurskyi
Manager	Ruslan Rotan
League	Ukrainian Premier League
2024–25	Ukrainian Premier League, 4th of 16
Website	polissyafc.com
Home colours Away colours Third colours
Current season

Football Club Polissya Zhytomyr (Ukrainian:Футбольний клуб «Полісся» Житомир) is a Ukrainian professionalfootball club based inZhytomyr,Polissya. It plays in theUkrainian Premier League, the top tier of Ukrainian football.

The original Soviet team of masters became defunct after the 2004–05 season and for almost decade the city was without its professional club, although the Polissya football academy as a specialized sports school continued to play at local competitions.

The club traces its history back to 1959 when there was created the first "team of masters" (Soviet terminology of professional team). However, the team functioned before 1959 at republican level which was considered to be amateur. For example, in 1958 Avanhard Zhytomyr became a champion of Zhytomyr Oblast.

In Soviet times, the club carried the nameAvtomobilist (car maker), then it changed toPolissya (the name for the local region (Polesie), which means (roughly) the wooded area). In the Ukrainian soccer competitions the club was calledKhimik (chemist) for a few seasons, then again changed back toPolissya. Note that during the Soviet times sometime in the 1970s inZhytomyr there was another club FC Khimik Zhytomyr that was sponsored by the local chemical factory, the latter fate of which is not known. The same factory has supportedPolissya already in times of the independent Ukraine for few seasons giving the club the name of its own former football representative, which already was mentioned before.

After the disastrousseason of 2005, it became defunct. However soon after the reorganization two clubs were created and were admitted to theSecond League for the 2005/06 season –MFK Zhytomyr andFC Zhytychi Zhytomyr. In March 2006, the municipal administration stopped funding ofMFK Zhytomyr, and the team was dissolved on 30 April 2006.FC Zhytychi Zhytomyr finished 8th in theSecond League'06, but next year they failed to submit their license and stopped their participation on the professional level.

The highest position the club achieved was fourth place in thePersha Liha, twice. Because of this, in2002, it was awarded to play a play-off match withPFC Olexandria inKyiv to receive the promotion to theVyscha Liha.Polissya lost it 0:1. Subsequent seasons have brought progressively worse results with every year.

In 2005, an attempt to create the municipal club took place on initiative of Hennadiy Zabrodsky soon after the dissolution of FC Polissya Zhytomyr. At that time, facing a danger of losing professional football team, Zhytomyr paradoxically witnessed creation of two teams in the place of one. The new club was created in place of the existing amateur FC Arsenal Zhytomyr. The creation of the city club was supported by the city's government as part of local elections, which, however, after the city mayor lost, the club, after playing first half of the season, was dissolved. Some players moved to the regional clubOFC Zhytychi Zhytomyr.

In November 2015, FC Polissia Zhytomyr applied for the2016–17 Ukrainian Second League.^[1] On 23 March 2016 the deputy mayor of Zhytomyr Matviy Khrenovu announced in his Facebook that new director of MFC Zhytomyr became a head of Zhytomyr Rayon Football Federation Ruslan Pavlyuk.^[2]

In March 2017, the club was renamed into FC Polissya Zhytomyr.^[3] The club also adopted a new logo with 1959 year of establishment thus claiming heritage of the original FC Polissya Zhytomyr.^[4]

Since 2021, the club has been financed by the BGV Group which controls a network ofATB-Market retail stores.^[5]

In May 2023, FC Polissya Zhytomyr won Ukrainian First League with three rounds left till the end of the tournament, reaching the Ukrainian Premier League for the first time in the club's history.^[6] Next year, the club finished 5th in Premier League, which led to the club's first ever participation in European competitions.^[7]

MFC Zhytomyr started to play at Tsentralnyi Stadion (Central Stadium), however soon at the stadium started renovations and the club moved to smaller Kolos Stadion.^[8]

In 2017, the club temporarily moved toKorosten to play at the local Spartak Stadion which was approved by theFootball Federation of Ukraine and Professional Football League.

In March 2021, Polissya returned toTsentralnyi Stadion, after 16 years of reconstruction.^[9]

As of 14 September 2025^[10][11]

Note: Flags indicate national team as defined underFIFA eligibility rules; some limited exceptions apply. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.

No. Pos. Nation Player 1 GK  UKR Oleh Kudryk 2 DF  ALB Andi Hadroj 4 DF  UKR Mykyta Kravchenko 5 DF  UKR Eduard Sarapiy 7 FW  UKR Oleksandr Nazarenko 8 MF  UKR Ruslan Babenko 9 FW  UKR Oleksandr Filippov 10 MF  ISR Tomer Yosefi 11 MF  UKR Oleksiy Hutsulyak 12 GK  UKR Heorhiy Bushchan(on loan fromAl-Shabab) 13 DF  BRA Lucas Taylor 15 DF  UKR Bohdan Mykhaylichenko 18 MF  UKR Oleksandr Andriyevskyi 19 MF  UKR Volodymyr Shepelyev 22 MF  UKR Vladyslav Veleten

No. Pos. Nation Player 23 GK  UKR Yevhen Volynets 29 MF  CGO Borel Tomandzoto 30 MF  UKR Bohdan Lyednyev 31 DF  GEO Giorgi Maisuradze 34 DF  BRA João Vialle 37 MF  BRA Talles Costa 40 FW  POR André Gonçalves 44 DF  UKR Serhiy Chobotenko(captain) 45 FW  UKR Maksym Braharu(on loan fromDynamo Kyiv) 55 DF  UKR Borys Krushynskyi 60 MF  UKR Maksym Melnychenko 70 FW  CGO Jerry Yoka 73 DF  UKR Danylo Beskorovaynyi 89 FW  UKR Mykola Hayduchyk 99 GK  UKR Viktor Ulihanets

Note: Flags indicate national team as defined underFIFA eligibility rules; some limited exceptions apply. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.

No. Pos. Nation Player — MF  UKR Yevheniy Mykytyuk

No. Pos. Nation Player — MF  UKR Nikita Petruk

Note: Flags indicate national team as defined underFIFA eligibility rules; some limited exceptions apply. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.

No. Pos. Nation Player — MF  AZE Emil Mustafayev(atSumgayit FK until 30 June 2026) — DF  UKR Serhiy Korniychuk(atVeres Rivne until 30 June 2026) — DF  CRO Matej Matić(atPolonia Bytom until 30 June 2026)

No. Pos. Nation Player — FW  MKD Dimitar Trajkov(atFK Rabotnichki until 30 June 2026) — FW  CGO Béni Makouana(atFK Jablonec until 30 June 2026) — FW  VEN Luifer Hernández(atChornomorets Odesa until 30 June 2026)

Had international caps for their respective countries. Players whose name is listed inbold represented their countries while playing for Polissya Zhytomyr.

• Ruslan Pavlyuk, 2016–2017
• Vitaliy Lyaskovskyi, 2017–present

Polissya Zhytomyr has participated in European competition since 2024, playing its first game againstOlimpija Ljubljana in the2024–25 UEFA Conference League. Their first win Polissya obtained in an away game againstFC Santa Coloma, which was their fourth game at European level.

Season	Competition	Round	Opposition	Home	Away	Aggregate
2024–25	UEFA Conference League	Second qualifying round	Olimpija Ljubljana	1–2	0–2	1–4
2025−26	UEFA Conference League	Second qualifying round	FC Santa Coloma	1–2	4–1	5–3
		Third qualifying round	Paks	3–0	1–2	4–2
		Play-off round	Fiorentina	0–3	2–3	2–6

• Ukrainian First League
  • Winners (1):2022–23
• Football Championship of the Ukrainian SSR
  • Winners (1): 1967
  • Runners up (2): 1973, 1975
• Football Cup of the Ukrainian SSR [among the Second League teams] (2)
  • Winners (2):1972,1990
  • Runners up (1): 1974
• Zhytomyr Oblast
  • Winners (1): 1958

Three years after FC Polissya was dissolved, in 2008, Polissya fielded its academy team at the national level, playing among amateurs. Several years after FC Polissya was revived in 2024, Polissya-2 entered the Ukrainian Second League (third tier).

• 2024–25 Kishan Hautam
• 2025–26Oleksandr Maksymov

• Ukrainian Records
• Soviet Records
• Football club FC Polissya. Zhytomyr City Journal. 10 July 2009
• Official website
• Buha, Bohdan.How the Cup was stripped away from the Cup's Masters (ЯК ЗАБРАЛИ КУБОК У «КУБКОВОГО БІЙЦЯ»). uaf.ua. 11 January 2012
• Reshnyuk, M."Our instance is the mayor's initiative". Prof-football is returning to Zhytomyr ("Наш случай – это инициатива мэра". В Житомир возвращается проффутбол). UA-Football. 8 July 2017
• Maksim Maksimov.The chronological row of current events or Who will return the Big Football to Zhytomir? (Хроника текущих событий, или Кто вернет в Житомир Большой футбол?). UA-Football. 4 April 2012.

• FC Polissya Zhytomyr
• Football clubs in Zhytomyr Oblast
• Sport in Zhytomyr
• Association football clubs established in 1959
• 1959 establishments in Ukraine
• Avanhard (sports society)
• Spartak (sports society)
• Ukrainian Premier League clubs
• Korosten
• Phoenix clubs (association football)

• CS1 Ukrainian-language sources (uk)
• Use dmy dates from August 2021
• Articles with short description
• Short description is different from Wikidata
• Articles containing Ukrainian-language text