# 1996–97 Vyshcha Liha

The 1996–97 Vyshcha Liha season was the 6th since its establishment. FC Dynamo Kyiv were the defending champions.

## Preseason changes

Number of teams in the league was reduced from 18 to 16. Vyshcha Liha became a member of the newly established Professional Football League of Ukraine.

## Teams
### Promotions

* Vorskla Poltava, the champion of the 1995–96 Ukrainian First League – (debut)

### Renamed

Before the start of season CSKA-Borysfen Kyiv was replaced with CSKA Kyiv which played in tier 3. Just before the start of new 1996–97 season a scandal took place related to ownership. Dmytro Zlobenko was removed from the club which with help of the Army was passed to some businessman by name of Mikhail Grinshpon, a president of "Kyiv–Donbas". Concurrently, Mikhail Grinshpon was an adviser to the Ukrainian Minister of Defense Oleksandr Kuzmuk.

### Location
## Managers

| Club | Coach | Replaced Coach | Home stadium |
| FC Dynamo Kyiv | Valery Lobanovsky | Yozhef Sabo 17 games(first half) | Dynamo Stadium |
| FC Shakhtar Donetsk | Valery Yaremchenko | | Shakhtar Stadium |
| FC Vorskla Poltava | Viktor Pozhechevskyi | | Vorskla Stadium |
| FC Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk | Vyacheslav Hrozny | | Meteor Stadium |
| FC Karpaty Lviv | Myron Markevych | | Ukraina Stadium |
| SC Tavriya Simferopol | Mykola Pavlov | Serhiy Shevchenko 10 games Ivan Balan 5 games Valeriy Shvediuk 7 games | Lokomotyv Stadium |
| FC Chornomorets Odesa | Leonid Buriak | | Black Sea Shipping Stadium |
| FC Metalurh Zaporizhzhia | Oleksandr Tomakh | | Metalurh Stadium |
| FC Nyva Ternopil | Ihor Yavorskyi | | City Stadium |
| FC Zirka Kirovohrad | Oleksandr Dovbiy | Oleksandr Ischenko 22 games Mykhailo Kalyta 1 game | Zirka Stadium |
| FC CSKA Kyiv | Volodymyr Lozynskyi | | CSK ZSU Stadium |
| FC Kryvbas Kryvyi Rih | Oleksandr Lysenko | Oleksiy Cherednyk 12 games | Metalurh Stadium |
| FC Prykarpattia Ivano-Frankivsk | Viktor Kolotov | Boris Streltsov 5 games | Elektron Stadium |
| FC Torpedo Zaporizhzhia | Viktor Matvienko | Ihor Nadein 27 games | AvtoZAZ Stadium |
| FC Kremin Kremenchuk | Mykhailo Byelykh | | Dnipro Stadium |
| FC Nyva Vinnytsia | Oleksandr Ischenko | Pasha Kasanov 23 games Volodymyr Reva 2 games | Central City Stadium |
Notes: Games between Dynamo Kyiv and CSKA Kyiv were played at the Republican Stadium.

### Changes

| Team | Outgoing head coach | Table | Incoming head coach | Table |
| FC Shakhtar Donetsk | Valeriy Rudakov | pre-season | Valery Yaremchenko | pre-season |
| SC Tavriya Simferopol | Anatoliy Zayayev | pre-season | Serhiy Shevchenko | pre-season |
| FC CSKA Kyiv | Viktor Chanov | pre-season | Volodymyr Lozynsky | pre-season |
| FC Karpaty Lviv | Volodymyr Zhuravchak | pre-season | Myron Markevych | pre-season |
| FC Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk | Bernd Stange | pre-season | Viacheslav Hrozny | pre-season |
| FC Kryvbas Kryvyi Rih | Myron Markevych | pre-season | Oleksiy Cherednyk | pre-season |
| FC Prykarpattia Ivano-Frankivsk | Ihor Yurchenko | pre-season | Boris Streltsov | pre-season |
| FC Kremin Kremenchuk | Valery Yaremchenko | pre-season | Mykhailo Bilykh | pre-season |
| FC Nyva Vinnytsia | Serhiy Morozov | pre-season | Pasha Kasanov | pre-season |

## League table

| Pos | Team | Pld | W | D | L | GF | GA | GD | Pts | Qualification or relegation |
| 1 | Dynamo Kyiv (C) | 30 | 23 | 4 | 3 | 69 | 20 | +49 | 73 | Qualification to Champions League first qualifying round |
| 2 | Shakhtar Donetsk | 30 | 19 | 5 | 6 | 72 | 28 | +44 | 62 | Qualification to Cup Winners' Cup qualifying round |
| 3 | Vorskla Poltava | 30 | 17 | 7 | 6 | 50 | 26 | +24 | 58 | Qualification to UEFA Cup first qualifying round |
| 4 | Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk | 30 | 14 | 13 | 3 | 48 | 19 | +29 | 55 | Qualification to UEFA Cup first qualifying round |
| 5 | Karpaty Lviv | 30 | 15 | 7 | 8 | 36 | 23 | +13 | 52 | |
| 6 | Tavriya Simferopol | 30 | 13 | 5 | 12 | 36 | 46 | −10 | 44 | |
| 7 | Chornomorets Odesa | 30 | 12 | 6 | 12 | 36 | 31 | +5 | 42 | |
| 8 | Metalurh Zaporizhzhia | 30 | 12 | 5 | 13 | 48 | 44 | +4 | 41 | |
| 9 | Nyva Ternopil | 30 | 11 | 6 | 13 | 34 | 37 | −3 | 39 | |
| 10 | Zirka-NIBAS Kirovohrad | 30 | 11 | 3 | 16 | 31 | 55 | −24 | 36 | |
| 11 | CSKA Kyiv | 30 | 9 | 8 | 13 | 33 | 35 | −2 | 35 | |
| 12 | Kryvbas Kryvyi Rih | 30 | 9 | 6 | 15 | 24 | 48 | −24 | 33 | |
| 13 | Prykarpattya Ivano-Frankivsk | 30 | 8 | 7 | 15 | 33 | 49 | −16 | 31 | |
| 14 | Torpedo Zaporizhzhia | 30 | 8 | 5 | 17 | 25 | 56 | −31 | 29 | |
| 15 | Kremin Kremenchuk (R) | 30 | 7 | 3 | 20 | 28 | 57 | −29 | 24 | Relegated to Ukrainian First League |
| 16 | Nyva Vinnytsia (R) | 30 | 4 | 6 | 20 | 19 | 48 | −29 | 18 | Relegated to Ukrainian First League |
* 1 2 Participant of the 1997 Ukrainian Cup Final

## Results

| Home \ Away | CHO | CSK | DNI | DYN | KAR | KRE | KRY | MZA | NVT | NYV | PRY | SHA | TAV | TZA | VOR | ZIR |
| Chornomorets Odesa | — | 0–0 | 3–0 | 1–3 | 0–0 | 1–0 | 0–0 | 2–1 | 2–0 | 0–0 | 0–0 | 1–1 | 5–1 | 2–0 | 0–3 | 5–1 |
| CSKA Kyiv | 1–2 | — | 0–0 | 0–1 | 0–1 | 3–1 | 1–2 | 2–1 | 1–0 | 1–0 | 2–1 | 1–1 | 2–1 | 5–1 | 0–0 | 1–2 |
| Dnipro | 3–2 | 2–1 | — | 0–1 | 0–0 | 3–0 | 2–1 | 4–0 | 1–0 | 4–0 | 4–0 | 2–0 | 1–0 | 4–0 | 1–1 | 4–0 |
| Dynamo Kyiv | 2–0 | 2–2 | 2–2 | — | 2–0 | 5–0 | 5–0 | 1–2 | 1–0 | 2–0 | 2–1 | 3–1 | 3–0 | 2–1 | 2–1 | 6–1 |
| Karpaty Lviv | 1–0 | 1–2 | 0–0 | 0–2 | — | 4–0 | 5–1 | 1–0 | 3–1 | 1–2 | 3–1 | 1–0 | 1–1 | 2–0 | 2–0 | 2–0 |
| Kremin Kremenchuk | 1–0 | 0–2 | 1–1 | 1–4 | 0–1 | — | 2–1 | 4–1 | 3–2 | 3–0 | 2–1 | 0–1 | 2–3 | 1–1 | 0–4 | 1–0 |
| Kryvbas Kryvyi Rih | 1–0 | 2–1 | 0–0 | 0–2 | 1–2 | 1–0 | — | 1–0 | 2–0 | 3–0 | 1–1 | 1–3 | 1–0 | 2–1 | 1–1 | 0–2 |
| Metalurh Zaporizhzhia | 1–0 | 4–2 | 1–1 | 0–0 | 2–0 | 3–2 | 1–1 | — | 4–2 | 2–0 | 3–2 | 1–1 | 8–1 | 2–0 | 2–0 | 0–1 |
| Nyva Ternopil | 2–0 | 0–0 | 2–2 | 1–0 | 1–1 | 1–0 | 2–0 | 2–1 | — | 3–0 | 3–0 | 1–4 | 1–0 | 2–1 | 1–0 | 5–1 |
| Nyva Vinnytsia | 0–1 | 2–2 | 0–2 | 0–1 | 0–1 | 2–1 | 2–0 | 0–0 | 0–0 | — | 1–2 | 1–2 | 0–0 | 0–0 | 2–4 | 3–1 |
| Prykarpattya Ivano-Frankivsk | 2–4 | 0–0 | 2–2 | 0–2 | 1–2 | 2–0 | 2–0 | 3–2 | 0–0 | 2–1 | — | 2–1 | 1–2 | 2–1 | 0–2 | 0–0 |
| Shakhtar Donetsk | 3–0 | 3–0 | 1–0 | 1–3 | 0–0 | 4–2 | 6–0 | 4–2 | 5–0 | 1–0 | 2–0 | — | 4–0 | 9–1 | 4–0 | 3–1 |
| Tavriya Simferopol | 1–0 | 2–1 | 0–0 | 1–3 | 3–1 | 1–1 | 1–0 | 3–0 | 2–1 | 3–2 | 2–0 | 0–2 | — | 2–1 | 1–1 | 1–0 |
| Torpedo Zaporizhzhia | 1–2 | +:- | 1–3 | 0–0 | 1–0 | 1–0 | 1–0 | 0–4 | 0–0 | 1–0 | 1–1 | 2–1 | 1–3 | — | 2–3 | 3–1 |
| Vorskla Poltava | 2–1 | 1–0 | 0–0 | 4–3 | 0–0 | 2–0 | 4–0 | 3–0 | 2–1 | 3–0 | 2–0 | 1–1 | 1–0 | 2–0 | — | 3–0 |
| Zirka-NIBAS Kirovohrad | 0–2 | 2–0 | 0–0 | 0–4 | 2–0 | 2–0 | 1–1 | 1–0 | 1–0 | 2–1 | 2–4 | 2–3 | 2–1 | 1–2 | 2–0 | — |

## Top goalscorers

| Rank | Player | Club | Goals (Pen.) |
| 1 | Oleh Matviiv | Shakhtar Donetsk | 21 (6) |
| 2 | Serhii Rebrov | Dynamo Kyiv | 20 (6) |
| 3 | Serhiy Chuychenko | Vorskla Poltava | 14 (2) |
| 4 | Oleksandr Haidash | Tavriya Simferopol | 13 |
| 4 | Andriy Fedkov | Torpedo Zaporizhzhia | 13 (3) |
| 6 | Serhiy Mizin | CSKA / Chornomorets | 12 (3) |
| 7 | Serhiy Atelkin | Shakhtar Donetsk | 11 |
| 7 | Valentyn Poltavets | Metalurh Zaporizhzhia | 11 |
| 7 | Yakiv Kripak | Metalurh Zaporizhzhia | 11 (3) |
| 10 | Hennadiy Moroz | Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk | 10 |