About FC Desna Chernihiv

FC Desna Chernihiv is a Ukrainian football club from Chernihiv in the north of the country, founded in 1960 as Avanhard and named after the Desna river from 1961. In the Soviet era the club spent many years in the lower leagues, and for a period in the 1970s it was replaced by an army team that represented the city. Its home was the Chernihiv Stadium, named after Yuri Gagarin, which held about 12,000 spectators.

After Ukrainian independence Desna moved between the second and third tiers. It reached the Ukrainian Premier League for the first time in 2018, and in 2019–20 it finished fourth, its best ever result.

That fourth place took Desna into the 2020–21 UEFA Europa League, its only European campaign. Because of the pandemic, ties were single matches, and Desna lost 2–0 away to VfL Wolfsburg in the third qualifying round. In 2022 the Russian invasion devastated Chernihiv and damaged the club's stadium, and Desna stopped competing.