The 1940 Soviet football championship in Gruppa B (russian: Чемпионат СССР по футболу в группе «Б») was fifth season of the ( second tier) professional football competitions in the

Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...

. It was also the second season after revival of the second tier competitions and the last season before the

Nazi Germany Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...

invaded the

with the ongoing

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

. The season started on 2 May 1940 (following the International Workers' Day) with matches in Ukraine and the Caucasus republics. The season ended on 27 October 1940 in Kiev.

Teams

The league was reduced almost in half from 23 to 14 teams. The competitions were conducted in double

round robin Round-robin may refer to: Computing * Round-robin DNS, a technique for dealing with redundant Internet Protocol service hosts * Round-robin networks, communications networks made up of radio nodes organized in a mesh topology * Round-robin schedu ...

format where each team is playing with every other twice, at home and away.

Relegated

Two teams were relegated from the 1939 Gruppa A * FC Krasnaya Zaria Leningrad – 13th place ''(debut)'' * FC Dinamo Odessa – 14th place ''(debut, merged with Pischevik)'' ** Former Dinamo Odessa players continued to play under Pischevik's colors, while Pischevik team discontinued its participation at republican level in Ukraine.

Promoted

FC Dinamo Minsk FC Dinamo Minsk ( be, ФК Дынама Мінск, ''FK Dynama Minsk''; russian: link=no, ФК Динамо Минск) is a professional football club based in the Belarusian capital city of Minsk. It was founded in 1927 as part of the Sovi ...

– Champion of the Belorussian SSR ''(debut)'' * FC Pischevik Odessa – Runner-up of the Ukrainian SSR ''(debut)''

Renamed

* FC Krasnaya Zaria Leningrad was previously known as FC Elektrik Leningrad * FC Stroitel Baku was previously known as FC Temp Baku

League Standings

Top scorers

Number of teams by republics

External links

1940 Group B

RSSSF The Rec.Sport.Soccer Statistics Foundation (RSSSF) is an international organization dedicated to collecting statistics about association football. The foundation aims to build an exhaustive archive of football-related information from around th ...

{{Soviet First League seasons

1940 A calendar from 1940 according to the Gregorian calendar, factoring in the dates of Easter and related holidays, cannot be used again until the year 5280. Events Below, the events of World War II have the "WWII" prefix. January * Januar ...

Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nation ...