Dissolved 2014 Head coach Andrey Lavrik Manager Andrei Lavrik Ground Minsk | Ground Capacity 1,500 2013 11th Founded 28 March 2002 | |
 | ||
Full name Football Club Partizan Minsk League Belarusian Second League | ||
FC Partizan Minsk (Belarusian: ФК Партызан Мінск) is a Belarusian football club based in Minsk. The club was formerly a part of Russian-Lithuanian businessman Vladimir Romanov's soccer holding which also includes Scottish Premier League club Hearts and Lithuanian A Lyga side FBK Kaunas, before he withdrew his financial support in 2012. The club made their top flight debut in 2004.
Contents
History
The club was founded as MTZ-RIPO in 2002 as a merger of two Minsk teams from the Second League – Traktor Minsk, a club with a 55-year history, and Trudovye Rezervy-RIPO, a football academy-based team which only spent one season in the Second League. The merge allowed the new team to have their own football school to recruit young players from as well as financial supply from the Minsk Tractor Works, the main sponsor of Traktor Minsk.
MTZ-RIPO Minsk started playing in the Second League in 2002. In their first season the team finished first, and then did the same in the First League in 2003. Since 2004 they play in Belarusian Premier League.
Before the start of the 2010 season the club announced a name change. On January 27, 2010 the new name was revealed to be Partizan Minsk.
Partizan finished the 2010 Belarusian Premier League bottom of the table and hence were relegated. The following season in the Belarusian First League they finished second and had to face FC Vitebsk in a two-legged play-off, which they won 3–2 on aggregate to secure a place in the 2012 Belarusian Premier League.
In early 2012 the club was abandoned by their main sponsor Vladimir Romanov and consequently wasn't able to keep any of the first team players or obtain the Premier League license. Partizan withdrew from the Premier League, leaving it with only 11 teams. The team spent 2012 season playing at the amateur level in Minsk Championship. In 2013 they renamed to Partizan-MTZ Minsk and joined the Second League, before renaming back to Partizan Minsk in 2014.
Honours
Supporters
The club has a fierce rivalry with Dinamo Minsk. The support across the two Minsk clubs is drawn across political lines, with Dinamo fans being strongly right-wing and Partizan fans being strongly left-wing. Partizan fans are known for their anarchist, anti-government, anti-fascist, and pro-LGBT rights stances. As a result of their political views, they have a strong friendship with fans of Arsenal Kiev and SV Babelsberg.