Stepan Chubenko is a fan of the football club “Shakhtar” (Donetsk), “Avangard” (Kramatorsk), a player of the youth team “Avangard” (Kramatorsk). Stepan Viktorovich Chubenko was born on November 11, 1997 in the city of Kramatorsk (Donetsk region). He studied at school No. 12 of his hometown and was fond of sports. He was engaged in Greco-Roman wrestling, until football appeared in his life. He defended the goal of the youth team “Avangard” (Kramatorsk) and dreamed of becoming a professional goalkeeper. But the favorite team of the young man was Shakhtar, for the match of which he went to Donetsk, and also attended the club's away meetings in other cities of Ukraine.
In addition to his passion for sports, the guy led an active social life. We created a KVK team with friends, which also went to competitions in other Ukrainian cities. Together with friends from the sector, they took care of the orphanage in Kramatorsk, brought toys, clothes and treats to the kids. Stepan had a clear pro-Ukrainian position, knowing from an early age which path he wanted to choose. In 2014, when pro-Russian sentiments began to spread in the region, the guy did not hide his patriotic views, participated in pro-Ukrainian rallies, their organization.When the Ukrainian military arrived in Kramatorsk, Stepan and his friends continued volunteering - they brought them products and hygiene products. During the shelling, they helped elderly people to go down to shelters, carried water. Risking his life, the young man tore down the flag of the so-called DNR in the city square. When the Russian militants still managed to capture the city, he and his friends began to guerrilla. At the end of June, Stepan goes to Kiev. The father agreed, thinking that it would be safer for his son, but much later it turned out that Steop went not to work, but to enter welfare, where he was not taken for age. There were hundreds of Lev, and on July 23 he took a ticket for a train passing through the already occupied Donetsk. The young man will never get to his destination. It was in Donetsk that he was seized by pro-Russian militants and held for some time in the building of the local SBU.
On why exactly the guy was removed from the train, several versions will appear later. According to one of them, Stepan had a yellow-blue ribbon on his shoulder and a rose of the Lviv “Carpathians” inside, according to the other, he entered into a dispute with the separatists and defended his position on the indivisibility of the country. But it is known for sure that the bullying and beating of the young patriot began in Donetsk. At the same time, his parents knew almost nothing about his fate. Militants only once called the mother, reporting that her son was arrested by the Donetsk MGB. Stepan was taken from the SBU building to the village. Gorbachevo-Mikhailovka, where after several days of brutal torture they were shot. Immediately after the call, Stalin Vyacheslavovna, Stepan's mother, will go to Donetsk in search of her son. Not immediately, but still she managed to find out that her son was shot. The exhumation of the body came on Teacher's Day, October 3. Before his death, the boy was tortured, his front teeth knocked out, and then shot with several shots. The young man's hands were tied with tape behind his back, his face covered with a T-shirt, sneakers were removed from the murdered man. The body of the young patriot was brought to his native Kramatorsk, where he was buried on November 8, 2014. After that, the parents tried to find and bring to justice the executioners and killers of their son. The investigation lasted three years, and on November 10, 2017, three fighters of the so-called Kerch battalion were sentenced in absentia: life imprisonment.
Since 2015, an annual football tournament has been held in honor of Stepan, started by his friends. On November 21, 2016, a memorial plaque was opened on the building of the Kramatorsk school No. 12 in memory of the brave student, and since 2021 the school has been named after Stepan Chubenko. In December 2021, a monument to the young goalkeeper was opened near the Avangard stadium, and the Kramatorsk club itself permanently removed No. 1 from circulation, attaching it to its pet, who even in the face of death did not betray his convictions and remained forever 16 years old.
On May 7, 2016, a non-state award, the Order of the People's Hero of Ukraine, was presented in Kyiv.
On June 28, 2017, he was awarded the Order “For Courage” of the III degree (posthumously).
In the battalion “Sarmat” one of the BMPs was officially assigned the name Stepan Chubenko.
The Ukrainian Association of Football Reporters. established the Medal “Stepan Chubenko Medal. Dignity and Sport”
