Well-known Ukrainian journalist Artem Frankov shared his prediction for the first playoff match of the Europa League qualifying round between Dnipro-1 and Cypriot AEK, which will take place today in Slovakian Kosice.
Artem Frankov“We survived - the club from Cyprus is a fairly obvious favorite, if not in the light of the Kosice duel, but in terms of a two-legged confrontation! What to do, what to do...
Of course, without the war, the odds would have been more in our favor, but is it fundamental - given the complete lack of European Cup experience among our players? And in general, what kind of Cyprus is there - you will have to play not only with the champion of Aphrodite's Island, but, first of all, with the Pyrenean-Balkan team led by the Spanish head coach! Plus the Hungarian Gyurcho plus the Frenchman Farage plus the Israeli Altman - everything is at the core... I just named AEK's line of attacking midfielders.
In terms of game practice, the advantage of the Cypriot players is also obvious: no, their championship has not yet started, but AEK has already played four matches in the Champions League qualification (Midtjylland - 1:1, 1:1, relegation on penalties 3:4) and the UEL ( Partizan - 2:1, 2:2). With all the shortcomings of AEK's rivals, the result of the team of José Oltra (a major specialist in Segunda clubs) inspires respect.
As for Dnipro-1, of course, it played a lot of control fights of a not too clear level and with not very clear consequences, but the main thing in any case will be changes in the team. Successful head coach Igor Jovichevich (now at Shakhtar) was replaced not only by Oleksandr Kucher from Metalist, who was the leader in the first league, but by Kucher in tandem with Yevgeny Krasnikov, who will take care of the football business in the "young club" as a whole. Dnepr-1 lost a number of players of the main team during the calendar year, but gained a lot. This, taking into account the experience of Zorya and at least in the light of the first match of the Dnipro team in the season, inspires vague, but optimism,” said Frankov.
