In 1946 as well as 1947 the team played in the second group. The war consequences influenced not only the team itself, but the training process. E.g., Stakhanovets had to contract out for training matches at camp a young keeper of local FC Dinamo Tbilisi Vladimir Margania because Donetsk own goalies were injured.

In July, 1946, the society "Stakhanovets" was re-organized under the name "Shakhtar". The strongest club of Donbass was called now FC Shakhtar Stalino.

In 1947 an experienced coach from Moscow Aleksey Kostylev was appointed the manger of the team. That season the club was second of 13 in the Ukrainian zone. The next year proved higher ambitions of Shakhtar, which outran the rest of the second division clubs. In 1949 FC Shakhtar was promoted to the first division.

The first season turned to be unlucky. FC Shakhtar lost in 24 matches of 34, in 8 matches - sufficiently. There were different reasons. 40-year old Georgiy Bikezin finished his career. The senior coach Georgiy Mazanov failed to establsi a good team.

Bad results caused a coach's resignation. Viktor Novikov ran the club. The core players were Alexander Alapatov, Dmitriy Ivanov, Yuriy Petrov, Viktor Fomin, Nikolay Samarin and other. The team's performance got much better - 11 position and 33 points.

The season results were a good footing for the next bronze season 1951. It was the first time for Shakhtar to be among the honourable three.

Alexander Ponomarev, a famous Soviet forward, provided that year success. The players, who recorded 50% of the matches and more, received bronze jettons, third-place diplomas and titles "Master of sports".
Donetsk semi-final appearance was quite successful. FC Shakhtar made their first trip abroad to Bulgaria and Romania after having signed some good players from other teams.

All matches in 1952 took place in Moscow. It was a collapse year. That's why the next season 1953 the team joined the second Group B ran by a new coach Alexander Ponomarev.

It took them two years to return. In the meanwhile the players gained necessary experience to be among the best.