In Ukraine, football is not following politics. While Russia has absorbed Crimea, two of the peninsula’s football clubs are choosing to play out their schedules in Ukraine’s top-tier league.

The Ukrainian Premier League resumed in mid-March after its winter break with uncertainty surrounding the continuing participation of FC Sevastopol and FC Tavriya Simferopol. The clubs debated leaving Ukraine's top division for the Russian league, but decided to stay put until the end of this season.

As voting took place in the breakaway Crimean region's controversial referendum on March 16, Tavriya Simferopol was forced to play its home match against Dinamo Kiev in Ukraine's capital city. On April 5, Tavriya returned to its home base in Crimea for the first time since November 2013. It lost 2-0 to FC Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk leaving it at the bottom of Ukraine's15-team Premier League, having accumulated just nine points from 21 games played.

FC Sevastopol fared better on its return home on April 4, beating FC Vorskla Poltava 1-0. The Sevastopol-based team is in a better position than its Crimean neighbor with 22 points from 20 games played.

Meanwhile, the Russian Football Union is working to bring the Crimean teams into the Russian league for next season.

It might be too late for Tavriya, whose funding has dried up after the indictment of billionaire-owner Dmitry Firtash on bribery and corruption charges in the United States earlier this month, leaving the future of the club on the line.