OBAC Odessa
Odessa British Athletic Club (In Russian: «Одесский британский атлетический клуб» ОБАК in short, meaning: Odessian British Athletic Club) was an earlier Imperial Russian athletic club from Odessa, which was established on 1878 by British workers of the Indo-European Telegraph Company who in 1877 moved from Kerch to Odessa. History. The city of Odessa was the biggest city of the Imperial Russian South-West (see, Southwestern Krai) and was a municipality (Gradonachalstvo, an Imperial Russian administrative unit of the same level as governorate (gubernia) and oblast). In 1877 to the city from Kerch moved the Indo-European Telegraph  Company that employed many Brits (subjects of British Crown). In 1878 they organized the Odessa British Athletic Club (OBAC) which among other sports competitions cultivated the game of association football. They played at the field located in a neighborhood of Malofontanskaya doroga (Little-fountain Road), not far from a sea shore. For a long time OBAC was composed exclusively out of English only and beside playing between themselves, they conducted annual meetings with footballers of the Romanian city of Galați.