Canada | Far west of the Carpathians, Ukraine unites (w/ multimedia)

Toronto, Jun 9 | At any given time, an uncountable number of football universes exist in parallel. Such was the case in late May when Ukraine United and Shakhtar FC faced each other in a friendly match, not in the motherland, but on an artificial pitch at the 25-acre Ontario Soccer Centre.

Ukraine | Near Chernobyl, the ‘football forest’ designed to radiate life

Pripyat, Ukraine, Apr 29 | Twenty-two years ago, more than 1,000 buses commandeered from Kyiv rumbled north toward this company town to evacuate its 50,000 residents. By sunset on 27 Apr 1986, as Chernobyl reactor no. 4 burned, in one soldier’s recollection, like a “beautiful blue fire,” the town was empty.

Left behind in the silence: a newly built football stadium sitting just to the north of a bright yellow Ferris wheel, a gift from Soviet authorities in commemoration of the upcoming May Day holiday.

Shostakovich: ‘Football is the ballet of the masses’

A reflection about connections between gridiron football and ballet reminds us of the 1930 ballet The Golden Age (Op. 22), by Dmitri Shostakovich.