team's name to the Russian name of Dnieper River, Dnepr, as the Russian was the accepted language of the Soviet Union and the Soviet government. The team's performance did not change much until after 1968, when Dnepr obtained Andriy Biba and the new coach – Valery Lobanovsky. After that, it took the team three years to get promoted to the Soviet Top League and eventually finished in sixth place in 1972. Golden generation In 1973 and 1976, Dnepr reached the semi-finals of the USSR Cup. In 1978, the team was relegated to the lower league for two years. Their next return to the top flight was not as inviting as their first one and the team languished at the bottom of the table for several years. In the following years, the governing body of the team hired new promising coaches – Volodymyr Yemets and Hennadiy Zhizdik. After those changes, Dnepr became a strong contender for the Soviet championship winning it twice: once with Yemets and Zhizdik in 1983, and another one with Yevhen Kucherevsky in 1988. Also, in 1989 Dnepr became the first professional football club in the Soviet Union. During those years, the team featured many notable players such as Oleg Protasov, Hennadiy Lytovchenko, Oleksiy Cherednyk and Oleh Taran. Dnipro Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, the club took on the Ukrainian version name of Dnipro, the name of the biggest river and one of the major symbols of Ukraine. The club joined the football federation of the native country and remained one of the top contenders in the newly formed Ukrainian Premier League. The team received a silver medal in 1993, as well as the bronze in 1992, 1995, 1996, 2001 and 2004. The team also reached the Ukrainian Cup finals in 1995, 1997 and 2004, losing all three to Shakhtar Donetsk. Dnipro is currently controlled by the Privat Group. Success and downfall On 14 May 2015, Dnipro qualified for the 2015 UEFA Europa League Final by defeating Napoli 1–0 in Ukraine after having drawn 1–1 in Italy, the first time in the club's history that it reached the final in a European competition. Despite going up 1–0 in the sixth minute against Spanish side Sevilla, Dnipro eventually lost 3–2. Despite the defeat, the match crowned one of the club's greatest seasons, during which Dnipro had to play all of their home matches some 400 kilometres away