Oleg Fedorchuk: "Neither Dynamo nor Fenerbahce deserved to win"

Well-known Ukrainian coach and expert Oleg Fedorchuk shared his impressions of the first match of the 2nd qualifying round of the Champions League between Dynamo Kyiv and Turkish Fenerbahce (0:0), which took place last Wednesday in Lodz, Poland.

“The composition of Dynamo was read, and Lucescu guessed the only dubious position”

‒ Let's start with the first thing that matchesday starts with - lineups. Lucescu surprised by something?

- No, and I shouldn't have. Moreover, in the last sparring, Lucescu replaced the players - and it was easy to guess who was planned for Fenerbahce and who would start the next match on the bench.

Dynamo has a rather limited choice of players. In principle, the whole coaching idea is around the same clip of 15-20 football players. And if we usually wait for training camps in order to get some surprises, now, after six months without playing practice, for Dynamo, control games were more important for playing the basics than for some discoveries or new names.

Except for Vanat, perhaps no one would be considered for the start if we are talking about youth and reservists.

Therefore, I think there was only one question - around the left back. There was a choice - although all the same, of course, we are talking about the weakness of the position.

Dubinchak preferred Lucescu to Karavaev and was not mistaken, because the defender, who returned from Dnipro-1, was very active and pleasantly impressed with his work with the ball. He, perhaps, was the only one who completely outplayed his counterpart, the rest of the Dynamo did not have such an advantage one on one.

‒ Miron Markevich said before the match that Dynamo is the favorite, and the question is whether they will be able to put pressure on them in a quality manner. In fact, he put pressure on Fenerbahce, and quite high...

- I agree, indeed, the Turks played very well in the other half. They simply dominated on the left flank of their attack - and this is a reproach to the combination of Tsygankov-Kedzer, because the Pole very often (at least five times) fouled, and every free kick or corner from its edge was potentially dangerous due to the abundance of tall players from Fener ".

In addition, I did not like how Dynamo worked on the players in their penalty area. A lot of sharpness and nervousness emanated from under Popov. He often worked poorly with his players, together with Dubinchak they missed King and Valencia a couple of times.

‒ Who disappointed?

‒ Buyalsky and Shaparenko. Vitaly - unusual passivity. He simply disappeared into the game, while according to the scheme, he duplicates the role that Mkhitaryan played at Shakhtar ten years ago. Such a player should attack with a second pace and beat, and Buyalsky disappeared from the game.

Shaparenko often made the wrong decisions. An indicative moment in the 20th minute, when Dynamo got an excellent combination, and Kolya blocked the entrance to Verbich. Benjamin, by the way, could have played higher - sometimes he blocked the flank of Dubinchak and did not cover the space to Besedin.

‒ In the first half, the Turks forced Buschan to work three times, while the Kievans never once strained the Fenerbahce goalkeeper...

‒ I’m not inclined to blame Besedin for this — Artem clung, worked out, rather, Verbich and Tsygankov were expected to be more active, but they fell behind and during fast attacks did not even reach the aggravation zone.

The Turks, on the other hand, worked out their chances better, so 0-0 in the first half is more of a compliment for Dynamo and a disappointment for Fenerbahce.

“Dynamo substitutions corresponded to the logic, but were read 10 minutes earlier”

‒ Dynamo started the second half without substitutions, but they played much more actively. Did the “catch up” on Lucescu work?

- The people of Kiev achieved this by activating the center of the field. Shaparenko and Sidorchuk added to the movement and involvement of the game, the flanks worked very well, the efficient Besedin did not turn off.

Due to this, even without substitutions, Dynamo began not only to take a hit, but to outplay the opponent. Fenerbahce felt that Dynamo began to play more aggressively.

‒ Why did the tempo slow down a little at the end?

‒ The reason is timely substitutions from Jorge Jesus. They have quite high-quality players on the bench, like Bruma, who greatly added to the maneuverability of Fenerbahce.

We, on the other hand, had the impression that the Dynamo coaching staff was slow to replace them, because they wanted to squeeze the most out of the main set of players. Substitutions from Lucescu are quite consistent with the logic of the game, with one exception.

It seems to me that Tsygankov could have been replaced already by the 70th minute, his game didn’t go well, and the speedy Karavaev remained on the bench, who left a good impression in summer sparring.

Substitutions were read and needed even earlier, by 10 minutes, because that's how much a football player needs to get used to the game and enter it.

‒ 0:0 — a fair result?

- Yes. No one in this match deserved to win. Fenerbahce had a better first half, Dynamo — the second.

‒ The second leg in Istanbul will be more difficult, if only because of the real home field of the opponent. Why else?

‒ Dynamo currently does not have a player who can play high-quality counterattacks. This is a problem if we remember the previous successful trips of Dynamo to Fenerbahce and Besiktas.

In terms of pressure, as we can see, Jesus is not inferior to Lucescu. But due to mistakes, Dynamo, unfortunately, has an advantage - you need to deal with the reliability of the defense, where there was a lot of negligence (like Popov) or fouls (like Kendzera).

‒ What can change Lucescu to win?

- First of all, we need to work on the reliability of the selection and reduce the number of fouls. Work out a quality exit from defense to attack.

I don’t expect any changes in the start, even in the position of Kendzer/Karavaev — because Dynamo is inferior in height, riding, and the Pole is clearly better in this.

One question is Buyalsky. Either he was not in shape, or there was some kind of illness, but Vitaly played clearly below his capabilities.