Former midfielder of Lviv "Karpat" and the national team of Ukraine Yaroslav Khoma commented Team 1 yesterday's matches between "Dynamo" and "Dnipro-1".
Yaroslav Khoma— On the eve of the match in Poland, the management of "Dynamo" insisted that the Kyiv team would try to loudly slam the door, inflicting a defeat on the Istanbul giant. Indeed, the people of Dynamo cannot be denied diligence, but it turned out not to be enough to achieve the desired result on the international arena. A high level of training is required, and Mircea Lucescu's wards have had serious problems with this recently.
— He drew attention to the fact that yesterday the Dynamo team scored only once in the area of the visitors' goal. Agree, under such circumstances, it is almost impossible to count on a victory...
— To be honest, I thought that Dynamo, who were not affected by the result, would at least play to their own satisfaction yesterday, focusing on offensive operations. However, this did not happen. Perhaps because the advantage in the class of "Fenerbahce" was felt and this forced the nominal hosts to act with a look at the rear.
In addition, the Dynamo team once again stepped on the same rake, as they say, making unfortunate mistakes in defense. Goalkeeper Heorhiy Bushchan, who after the injury is still not in combat sports form, did not help either.
— What's next?
— You can't call Dynamo's performance in the European Cup campaign anything but a failure. In my opinion, if during the winter break the Kyivans do not strengthen themselves with a striker, then they will not avoid trouble in the all-Ukrainian arena. The decline in the game of the Dynamo players is obvious, it can be explained by a considerable squad of young performers in the Kyiv team, who for some reason had problems with physical training. But, unfortunately, the crisis dragged on.
— In your opinion, the failure of Dynamo in the Europa League will not lead to the resignation of head coach Mircea Lucescu?
— No, because the club management still trusts him. After all, it is remembered that even in Shakhtar, when it was headed by this Romanian specialist, not everything was always smooth. However, the experienced Lucescu managed to find opportunities to improve the situation. We will see how it will be this time, but the Dynamo team, in order not to end up near broken nights, no longer have the right to misfire in the UPL.
— Now about "Dnipro-1", which in the match in Alkmaar even dominated the local AZ in ball control...
— Still, for the sake of justice, it should be said that the hosts created more scoring opportunities, but the Dnipro team were close to not losing. Unfortunately, they lacked concentration at the end of the match, which AZ took advantage of. It was also alarming that the hosts scored after unfortunate mistakes by the guests during the insurance in their penalty area. This has already happened with the Dnipro team in matches with the same AZ and Vaduz in the first round.
I hope that Oleksandr Kucher's wards will seriously work on correcting miscalculations in the near future, and the accumulated international experience should come in handy not only at the end of the first part of the competition in the UPL, but also next spring, when they will play the Conference League playoff rounds. Although a lot will depend on whether the Dnipro team will be lucky enough to keep the current lineup in the winter.
Vasily MYKHAILOV
