Cherepovets

The stadium's main pitch holds 12,000, built for a bigger stage than the club now occupies. It sits unused — ruled unfit for competition — and Cherepovets play their home matches next door, on a training pitch that seats 589. In 2026 the ground itself changed its name, from Metallurg to Cherepovets — stadium and club now share one identity.

That identity has shifted before. The club's roots go back to 1956, when a factory team called Metallurg was formed in the city — some accounts push the story further, to 1912, though the professional count starts in 1956. Over the following decades it played as Severstal, Sheksna, Bulat and Stroitel before returning to Metallurg, then settling, with breaks, on Cherepovets from 1993. The yellow and black shirts gave it a nickname that stuck: the yellow-blacks. As Severstal and Sheksna, the club spent 2000 to 2012 in the Second Division. It won the West zone title in its first year there, then took silver in 2006 and bronze in the two seasons that followed.

Relegation at the end of that run sent the club down to amateur football, where it stayed for thirteen years. In that stretch it won the Vologda regional championship nine times and the national amateur title three times. Professional status came back in February 2025, when the club passed certification and re-entered paid football.

Vladimir Golev, born in 1940, coached in Cherepovets for decades before taking over as the club's owner and chairman of the board.

Dmitry Chernukhin managed that first season back among the professionals in 2025, then left early in 2026; Vladislav Galkin took over as head coach that February, with Cherepovets now playing in the Second League's Division B, group 2.