36 days in the cellar, escape to Germany, now 8 goals in 13 games for Stuttgart: The touching story of the Ukrainian talent Kirill Serdyuk.
Stuttgart – Kirill Serdyuk was nine years old when he started his career at his first football club “Azov-Stal”. His debut was against the Mariupol Football Academy. His team lost 4-2, but it was he who scored a brace. “At that moment I finally realized that football was my life,” said the now 16-year-old in an interview with Absolutely footballthe football portal from Home of Sports.
.Serdyuk was called by the Mariupol Football Academy six months later: “They said that I had great potential and that they would like to take me on as a student in order to develop me further. That was the best day of my life back then.” The now 1.97 meter tall attacker had great days and was named the best striker at several national tournaments.
VfB talent was suddenly in a war zone
On February 24, 2022, life changed for him and his entire family. The enemy from Russia attacked. Serdyuk recalled: “At around 5 a.m. he started bombing the still-sleeping city. We lived in a large nine-story house where all the windows were blown out by the explosion. My father took us into the hallway and said that there was a war and that we should take what we needed and run to the basement.”
Suddenly everything was different for the teenager, who never let the ball out of his hands during this time: “Then the most terrible 36 days of my life began. The enemy besieged the city, and it was hell. Our soldiers defended the city well, and the enemy started dropping rockets, shelling houses and fighting in the streets.” It was purely a fight for survival.
“We spent the whole time in the basement and cooked our food on an open fire. One evening, Russian reconnaissance came to our house and told us that in the morning we should tie white ribbons and go towards the Russian soldiers so that we would have a fifty percent chance of survival,” Serdyuk said. It was like a coin toss that decided fate.
Kirill Serdyuk’s father and his older brother made the right decision. This was followed by interrogations and the so-called “filtration”, a method of intimidation. A friend of the father’s who lived in Moscow took the family in. The trip to Germany followed. On May 9, 2022, they arrived in Cologne, where he wanted to gain a foothold.
Then things turned out differently: “First we were sent to Bochum to a distribution center for refugees, from there to Gießen, then to Alsfeld, then to Wetzlar, and finally we got permanent accommodation in Niederweidbach. So they took me away from good football clubs – but not from my dream. Because if football is in your heart, nothing can stop you.”
Serdyuk was already a fighter at this point. He began learning German at high school and moved via VfB Marburg to TSG Wieseck, a talent factory in Central Hesse. That’s where Raphael Guttmann discovered him, who recognized the great talent before anyone else: “Since then, we’ve been following my football path together with Raphael – like a family. He’s a real professional and understands his subject excellently.”
For Serdyuk we went on to 1. FC Nürnberg – a stopover. In the summer of 2025, the captain of the Ukrainian U17 national team landed at VfB Stuttgart. His balance after six months with the Swabians: eight goals in 13 games in the youth league. The playing style of the jewel is very reminiscent of Nick Woltemade. Comparisons are difficult to draw.
With Serdyuk you can quickly see the direction in which his development can go. He has worked on his header game, is very mobile, agile in the box despite his size and can hardly be separated from the ball. Above all, Serdyuk is incredibly willing to learn and ambitious. He is living his dream and wants to end up at the top.
Kirill Serdyuk had to learn to fight and bite early in his life. He didn’t have a regular everyday life for weeks; the fear of the enemy was a constant companion. The love of football has always driven him – and that hasn’t changed now: “I am very grateful to Germany that this country took us in and gave me the chance to realize the dream of my life – to become a top striker. I love this sport and will do everything – and even more – to make my dream come true.”
