Baku Sportinq

Promotion out of the third tier does not happen twice for the same club, and Baku Sportinq spent the 2023/2024 season making sure of it, taking the Azerbaijan Second League title and going up to the First League. The run through that campaign included a first qualifying round of the Azerbaijan Cup in which they put six past Kürmük Qax without reply.

The club itself is barely into its second decade. Röyal Nəcəfov captains a squad built mostly from local players and others picked up from the lower tiers and from clubs across the border, with striker Shahin Balijani among those who have carried the attacking weight.

There is no old score to settle on derby day. Xəzri Buzovna once represented the same district and has since folded, and nothing has risen locally to replace it as a rival worth the name.

Home games are played at the Baku Sportinq Arena, known locally as the Buzovna Stadionu. It is a small ground for a club still finding its level, tucked into the Buzovna district it has yet to share with anyone in the way of a genuine rivalry.