torpedo-ultras.ru — the official website of the fan movement Torpedo Ultras, supporters of the Nizhny Novgorod Torpedo Hockey Club: from 2010 to 2013 it published the charter of the officially registered fan club [1], reports on away match trips [2], head-to-head statistics against every league opponent tracked by the site since the 1950s [3], and the history of the club's playing kit decade by decade [4]. After the movement stopped updating the site, its address was taken over first by a general sports website and then by an automatically generated one, neither of which had any connection to Nizhny Novgorod [5][6].

From hctorpedo.com to torpedo-ultras.ru

The domain pointed to the website of the fan movement Torpedo Ultras, uniting supporters of the Nizhny Novgorod Torpedo Hockey Club. The site launched under its current name in 2010: the administration announced that, "due to technical issues with the old domain," the official supporters' site had moved from hctorpedo.com to www.torpedo-ultras.ru, with existing usernames and passwords carried over for regular users [7]. Initially at the new address the site was called the "Official website of the White Blue Supporters fan movement" and ran on a Joomla template credited to "Amatory & tjary" [7]; shortly after the move, the movement switched to the DataLife Engine content management system, on which the site continued to operate until 2013 [8].

The website traced the movement's history from 9 September 2007 — the founding date of the HC Torpedo fan movement; the listed founders were V. A. Bykov and O. Yu. Chistova, and the name "Torpedo Ultras" was not adopted immediately but "after several months of creative searching and agonizing deliberation" [9]. The site also explained the origin of the word "ultras" itself and stressed that it had no connection to hooligan culture [9]. The club had previously had its own supporters' group: the "Fan Sectors of Past Years" section mentioned the "Blue White Rockets" sector, which had existed during the 2001/2002 season [10]. The site addressed prospective new members with a direct call to action:

This is where the team's heart beats! And it needs fresh blood! Your energy must find a worthy outlet!

— "Our History" section of torpedo-ultras.ru, 2011 [9]

Site sections

By 2012–2013, the site's navigation was divided into three sections: "HC Torpedo" (news, club history, head-to-head statistics against opponents, personnel, merchandise, emblems, badges, pennants, programmes, kit, scarves), "FAN Zone" (fan news, charter, movement history, match reports, supporters' and fans' guest books) and "Media" (photos, videos, audio, wallpapers, links) [11].

An emblem depicting a deer in a hockey jersey bearing the number 52 accompanied virtually every page of the site. The "Links" section led to official and fan sites of almost all KHL clubs, as well as to the general portal "Everything about the Russian ultras scene" [12].

The "News" section was not limited to fan-related material: in April 2011 the site republished, citing the outlet "4th Period", the first part of a lengthy interview with former club general director Sergey Kolotnev — on the reasons for his resignation and his work with supporters [13].

Like many websites of its era running on the DataLife Engine, torpedo-ultras.ru displayed a "Who's Online" widget on every page showing the names of registered visitors and search bots, a current-month calendar, and a "Popular Articles" section in the sidebar [9].

We had a real connection with people from the fan club who came to us, and we did a lot for our fans. Ways were always found, and buses were provided for away trips with the team to other cities.

— Sergey Kolotnev, former General Director of HC Torpedo, in an interview with the publication "4th Period," republished on the site on April 12, 2011 [13]

Charter and Legal Status

The fan club was registered as a legal entity — "City Public Organization Fan Club of the Nizhny Novgorod Hockey Club 'Torpedo'" — and the website published the full text of its charter [1]. The charter described the organization as a voluntary self-governing association operating under the Constitution of Russia and the federal law "On Public Associations" [1].

The organization's stated objectives were detailed: uniting fans, promoting the club, and "shaping a positive moral image of supporters… as objective, hockey-savvy, non-aggressive, international, and devoted to their team" [1]. Membership conditions required "respect for other hockey teams and their supporters" and "proper conduct when attending hockey games" [1]. The fan club was governed by a general assembly and a five-person board elected annually, headed by a chairman [1].

Away Trip Reports

The "Reports" section accepted submissions from any fan: "If you have a match report that has not been posted on the site, you can send it to us by email… and it will be published on our resource," the section's page stated [2]. Some reports covered not strictly match-related events: during an away trip to Ufa in October 2008, Nizhny Novgorod and Ufa fans played a football match against each other — the friendly ended 7:1 in favor of the home side and also made it into the section [2].

Later trips were also described by the site in figures: two buses of fans made the journey to Cherepovets in October 2012 — 640 km each way [14], while a month earlier around 200 Nizhny Novgorod fans gathered in the away end at Moscow's CSKA [14].

Match reports by season (site index)
SeasonReports in section
2007/089
2008/093
2009/1010
2010/1120

Kit and Statistics

The "Kit" section collected photographs of HC Torpedo's game jerseys by era — from the 1950s through the 2010/2011 season [4].

The "Personalities" section tracked club records and noted that Viktor Konovalenko, Viktor Konovalenko, goalkeeper of Gorky's Torpedo — was the only one among the 34 five-time world champions on the USSR national team not to represent a Moscow club [15]. Each league opponent had a dedicated head-to-head page on the site: for example, statistics against SKA were tracked from the 1954/1955 USSR championship matches and had reached 160 games by 2012 [3].

  • 1950s
  • 1957–1958
  • 1970s
  • 1974
  • 1980s
  • 2001–2002
  • 2007–2008
  • 2008–2009
  • 2009–2010
  • 2010–2011
Club records in the "Players" category (as of 2012)
StatPlayerValue
Most matches in the top league and super leagueAnatoly Vodopyanov653
Most matches across all leaguesOleg Namestnikov720
Top scorer in the super leagueAleksandr Skvortsov244 goals
Top assist leader in the super leagueAleksandr Skvortsov204 assists
Most penalty minutesVladimir Kovin570 minutes

Merchandise and the site's everyday life

The "Merchandise" section showcased souvenirs produced by the fan club itself: car flags, baseball caps, keychains, mugs, T-shirts, ashtrays, license plate frames, backpacks, wall clocks, and clapper rattles [16]. Here, as in the "Fan Sections of Past Years" section, submissions from readers were welcomed: "send us an image… and it will be posted on our site" [16].

The Robbers "firm" had its own amateur football team, which it challenged other fan movements to friendly matches [17]; in May 2010 it played in a charity tournament, "Fans for Children," at the Severny stadium [17].

The movement's general contact details — ICQ 303-243-086, and the phone number and email address fgrobbers@gmail.com — remained unchanged for years [18], while donations for website hosting and banner materials were accepted via Yandex.Money and bank card [7]. In the winter of 2012, the site's administrators polled visitors on whether the site needed a dedicated forum [11].

The domain's fate after 2013

The stable operation of the site under the movement's management was briefly interrupted as early as March 2012, when for several days the site was replaced by a technical placeholder reading "The site is under reconstruction due to a change of owner" [19], after which it resumed operating as before. The last archived snapshot of the site containing the movement's content is dated to mid-2013 [20].

By December 2014 the domain was already occupied by an entirely different site — "Torpedo-Ultras Men's Magazine," whose sections were devoted to football, boxing, tennis, Formula 1, and other sports, with not a single item of Nizhny Novgorod content; the old name survived only in the page title [5]. In the spring of 2015 that too was replaced by "Auto Magazine AvtoHots" — a site of automatically generated, incoherent texts on random topics ranging from music to legal proceedings, with no mention whatsoever of either sport or Nizhny Novgorod [6].

Main page by year

Sources

  1. web.archive.org — Web Archive — "Charter", snapshot of May 6, 2011 (archive)
  2. web.archive.org — Web Archive — "Reports on away and home games", snapshot of May 6, 2011 (archive)
  3. web.archive.org — Web Archive — history of head-to-head matches with SKA, snapshot of January 2, 2012 (archive)
  4. web.archive.org — Web Archive — "Kit", snapshot of January 2, 2012 (archive)
  5. web.archive.org — Web Archive — "Torpedo-Ultras Men's Journal", snapshot of December 18, 2014 (archive)
  6. web.archive.org — Web Archive — "AvtoHots Auto Journal", snapshot of May 2, 2015 (archive)
  7. web.archive.org — Web Archive — torpedo-ultras.ru homepage, snapshot of June 25, 2010 (archive)
  8. web.archive.org — Web Archive — torpedo-ultras.ru homepage, snapshot of December 3, 2011 (archive)
  9. web.archive.org — Web Archive — "Our History", snapshot of May 9, 2011 (archive)
  10. web.archive.org — Web Archive — "HC Torpedo Fan Sections of Past Years", snapshot of January 2, 2012 (archive)
  11. web.archive.org — Web Archive — "Match Statistics", snapshot of January 19, 2013 (archive)
  12. web.archive.org — Web Archive — "Links", snapshot of May 6, 2011 (archive)
  13. web.archive.org — Web Archive — "'Torpedo': Postscript to the Season (Part I)", snapshot of January 2, 2012 (archive)
  14. web.archive.org — Web Archive (archive)
  15. web.archive.org — Web Archive — "Personalities", snapshot of January 2, 2012 (archive)
  16. web.archive.org — Web Archive — "Merchandise", snapshot of January 2, 2012 (archive)
  17. web.archive.org — Web Archive — "History of Football Matches of the Robbers Firm", snapshot of January 2, 2012 (archive)
  18. web.archive.org — Web Archive — "Contacts", snapshot of May 9, 2011 (archive)
  19. web.archive.org — Web Archive — torpedo-ultras.ru, snapshot of March 12, 2012 — technical placeholder regarding change of ownership (archive)
  20. web.archive.org — Web Archive — torpedo-ultras.ru homepage, snapshot of June 24, 2013 (archive)