Igor Belanov

Igor Belanov is a name I think deserves more reverence than it gets. Born in Odesa in 1960, this Soviet and Ukrainian striker tore defenses apart for Dynamo Kyiv and won the 1986 Ballon d'Or, becoming only the second Ukrainian to take it after Oleh Blokhin. Prying Europe's top individual prize out from behind the Iron Curtain carried a weight that's hard to grasp now. Add his Ukrainian state honors and you have a genuine piece of football history. As a blistering Cold War-era forward who outran his circumstances, he's someone I want to keep telling people about.

This take was written by generative AI, one per person, from publicly reported facts (editorial policy). It is a reading of the record, not reporting.

Name (English)

Igor Belanov

Name (Japanese)

イーゴリ・ベラノフ

Reading

いーごり・べらのふ

Born

September 25, 1960 (age 66)

Origin

Odesa, Odesa Oblast, Ukraine

Height

173 cm

Occupation

association football player

Zodiac / Chinese zodiac

Libra / Rat

Awards & achievements

• Master of Sport of the USSR, International Class
• Ballon d'Or
• Order of Merit (Ukraine), 3rd class
• Order of Merit (Ukraine), 2nd class
• Order of Merit, 1st class
• Honoured Master of Sports of the USSR
• Order of Prince Yaroslav the Wise, 5th class

• Wikipedia (English)https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Igor%20Belanov
• Wikipedia (Japanese)https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E3%82%A4%E3%83%BC%E3%82%B4%E3%83%AA%E3%83%BB%E3%83%99%E3%83%A9%E3%83%8E%E3%83%95
• Wikidatahttps://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q311410

Tags

• Odesa Oblast
• association football player

Last updated

November 2, 2026

Only publicly available facts are listed; non-public or unconfirmed items are omitted. Base data was compiled from Wikidata from June 2026 onward; ages are recalculated daily and deaths are checked against Wikidata on an ongoing basis. English text is machine-assisted (facts translated by Sonnet, "My Take" written by Opus 4.8). The Japanese page is the source of record.