President of the All-Ukrainian Association of Football Coaches, Honored Coach of Ukraine Mykola Pavlov in an interview "TEAM1" answered topical questions related to Ukrainian football and the realities of life during the war.
Mykola Pavlov
— Mykola Petrovych, what does football mean to you during the war?
— This is a very good and great matter, and I can only repeat what has already been said more than once. The suspension of the championship of Ukraine would have a strong impact on our professional football, which would lose a lot. Then we would rebuild it for a long time.
This is not the case in children's football, and I can see it in FC "Left Bank". Many of our boys went away at the beginning of the war, but when they returned, they played for a month as if nothing had happened. This does not happen in professional football, here you need to plan everything clearly. Now we see it on the example of Dynamo. While playing many charity matches, the team was not able to lay the foundation properly and is now suffering from it.
However, in order to give a clear assessment of the level of individual teams and the championship as a whole, you need to be there, inside, and I am currently watching the matches as a simple fan.
— Then what will be your general emotional impressions?
— I can talk about the work of coaches, because I still head the coaching association itself. So, I see that in the conditions of war, frequent relocations, suspension of matches and their postponements, young specialists show themselves much better. Would you agree with me that, for example, much more was expected from Mircea Lucescu, Yuriy Vernydub and Roman Hryhorchuk?
But look how confidently the teams of Ihor Jovichevich, Oleksandr Kucher, Yuriy Gura, Yuriy Virt, Oleksandr Pryzetka are stepping. And Valery Kriventsov had a good start to the season, and then something happened to his Metalist 1925.
— Human relations in the team and simple things in life have always been valued more by you than some tactical schemes and theoretical studies, and now, when the war is going on, it should be paid even more attention?
- Definitely. Tablets and posters are not as necessary today as support and communication with boys. Each of us has enough acquaintances who in one way or another suffered from the invasion of these inhuman beings. I recently read that at least seven players of the youth national team of Ukraine have either parents or brothers defending our country. I can only imagine how difficult it is to work with these boys who are constantly worried about their relatives.
In addition, even during matches, alarms sometimes sound, football players spend a lot of time on the road - all this puts pressure on them, and simple, live communication should come to the fore. I'm not talking about team personnel at all. In my coaching staff, it never happened that after the match everyone got up and went home.
We always got together and discussed all the important non-football events that happened while we were preparing for the game. Of course, they drank 100 grams each, they did not forget to note the joyful events that happened after the previous match. This is life, and it is now even more important than football itself.
— It is hard to imagine a situation in which Mykola Pavlov goes to the shelter after announcing an air raid...
— I made the decision to stop my coaching career long before this war. But if you are interested, I will say that I would never go to any basement in my life. No security officer or match delegate would have forced me to do this.
— How do you like the performances of Ukrainian teams in the European Cups?
— Of course, I followed "Dynamo", "Shakhtar" and "Dniprom-1" in the group rounds of the tournaments in which they played. Only on the international arena can you assess the true level of these clubs - in the UPL with them, everything is clear. And there is a completely different level.
Unfortunately, only Shakhtar and, perhaps, Dnipro-1 pleased us. Everyone else failed in everything possible, so I will allow myself to agree with Myron Markevich, who noted that against all this background, our youth national team looks like a big bright spot. To solve such a difficult task at such a difficult time is a great achievement for the team, by the way, another young coach. And I once again congratulate Ruslan Rotan, his staff and all our young football players.
— You were one of the few who supported Rotan from the first day of his work in the youth department. Why did you have a premonition that everything would work out for him?
- Because I always respect parents with many children - these people do not know how to work, they have a high level of responsibility. We saw this on the example of the work of Andrii Shevchenko, who created such a national team of Ukraine that not only achieved serious results, but also played football that everyone liked. The same thing happened in Rotanya. I am looking forward to the European Youth Championship.
I really remembered the presentation of Ruslan's book - he invited me there. I know how difficult it is because I published a book myself, but I saw how this young man behaved, heard what people in the audience said about him, and then read what he wrote.
You know, I have never worked with the current youth mentor, but I have always followed him. I will explain why. Once, when "Metalurg" (Mariupol) was still hosting "Dnipro", I received a phone call from my old friend, former football player and coach Roman Shneiderman. We always talked with him when I came to Dnipropetrovsk, but he called me infrequently, and here...
"Kolia," Roman Hryhorovych said, "there is a boy playing in Dnipro, please pay attention to him, he is my pet." In general, I hardly follow the opponents' game, but in that match I remember one episode. The ball went down in a very high trajectory to the corner of the penalty area, and here it is expertly stopped by a player from Dnipro and makes a great pass to a partner. I ask: "Who is it?" They call me: "Rotan".
Since then, I have been following him, and when Roman Shneiderman passed away in 2010, I began to do it even more closely. I know Ruslan Rotan's life path, I remember how he moved to "Dynamo", I saw how he was the captain of "Dnipro" - a team that is not foreign to me, I understood what it was like to play 100 matches for the national team. But I did not meet people who spoke badly about him.
I confess that I do not personally wish every former football player a happy birthday, but I have Rotan's phone number, and I always send him a message.
- You have mentioned enough coaches - young and experienced. "Vorskla" coach Viktor Skrypnyk belongs to which cohort?
— Probably to the golden mean... I once said that for me a real coach is someone who knows how to work well in many teams, not just one. I hope that Skrypnyk will show himself well in Poltava as well, as he did in Zora. "Vorskla" has everything to be in the top three teams of the Ukrainian Premier League, because in terms of terms and wages, as far as I know, the team is definitely among the top three clubs in Ukraine.
— Unfortunately, in recent days Poltava football has been shaken by the tragic news of the death of a long-term official of the club, Gennadiy Slyusarev. What do you remember about working with this specialist?
— During my work in "Vorskla" he held the position of sports director. A specialist of his profile does not always work in close contact with the team, but I immediately insisted that a person with such life experience be with us constantly - at meetings and at matches. Was inside the team. I have repeatedly emphasized that during the four and a half years of working in Poltava, I have not missed a single match of the backup team - neither at home nor away. The day before the away game, the base got into the car and drove to the youth game. So, Gennadiy Slyusarev was always next to me, as well as our analyst. The observations and advice of Danylovych, as we all called him, were very valuable.
He hasn't been that close with the team in recent years. I don't know why, but it seems to me that his influence on Vorskla's football achievements has sometimes been underestimated. I will give an example. After we won the Cup of Ukraine in 2009, I wanted the work of all my assistants to be recognized in some special way. And when it was Slyusarev's turn, he didn't know how to thank him. I thought that Danylovych, who has worked for so many years in one city, in one club, has long been an honored worker of physical education and sports, and when it turned out that he did not have such an award, I was shocked. At the same moment, he gave the order to prepare the relevant documents, and Slyusarev, when he learned about it, could not hold back tears.
At the meetings, he started every day from the pool or from the sea. Walked along the Royal Path in Yalta. He bet with football players that he would be able to lose 5-7 kilograms of excess weight, and he won them. By personal example, he showed the players what character and will...
Danylovych helped a lot of football players when they were finishing their careers. He was the first to tell me that Vasyl Sachko would be a good coach, and we appointed him to the position of mentor of the newly formed U-19 team. Later, when Sachko was leading the first team, Gennadiy Slyusarev was always by his side and helped him a lot. I am sure that Vasyl Viktorovych will tell you only good words about him.
In "Vorskli" we had a good tradition - we welcomed all the women in the club and the wives of our staff from the coaching staff. We could entrust this mission only to Gennady Danylovych, and if someone's wife did not live in Poltava, he found people who would bring gifts from our headquarters to the birthday girls in any corner of the country.
I well remember Slyusarev's 65th birthday, which we celebrated in Poltava. Unfortunately, when I gathered friends for my birthday this summer, being in Poltava, he couldn't come, because he wasn't feeling well. However, he called three times in the evening and monitored our process. In this matter, he also had no equal.
— Can we say that your work in "Vorskla" was an aerobatic relationship with the club's managers?
- So. Remembering Gennady Slyusarev, I cannot help but mention our chief executive Oleg Babaev. I have repeatedly emphasized and written in the book that he is the best president of the club I have worked with. Unfortunately, he is no longer with us...
There were very few issues that Babayev could not solve, and if they arose, I immediately said that a meeting with Honorary President Konstantin Zhevago was necessary. Oleg Meidanovych never once refused me - for him it was the law. We met in Kyiv, in Poltava, and these were very vivid events. Zhevago is a young but already experienced manager and leader, an interesting interlocutor. And he also never refused me anything.
— I think you are the only coach who has met with Zhevago so often, although they say that Viktor Skrypnyk is also trying to follow the path of communication with the first person of the club...
— I do not have such information, but I note that not a single telephone conversation, let alone a letter or message, can replace a personal meeting. No one will convince me of this.
— Soon the results of the year will be summed up by the national team of Ukraine. How do you feel about the fact that with the current coach almost the entire country is already looking for his replacement?
— I don't like it, it's not nice and it shouldn't be like that, but Oleksandr Petrakov, in my opinion, himself gave the reason for these conversations. After the last game in Scotland, he showed his colleague with a characteristic gesture that it was the finish. That he is going…
Go out and tell the whole country: "I am ready to work further, I have the strength and desire. I am confident in myself, my assistants and the footballers I work with. I trust my supervisors. I will carry this burden as long as they believe in me." All. Point. Or vice versa: "I've made up my mind - I'm going."
Understand, a club coach can be persuaded, a national team coach cannot. It is the honor of the country. Especially now. In times of war, the coach of any team must demonstrate by personal example his confidence and readiness to solve the most difficult tasks. This is how the President of Ukraine is behaving now, and all leaders should emulate him.
— Mykola Petrovych, at a time when the Russian horde is destroying everything it sees, in the capital of Ukraine, right next to you, a real football oasis is being built. Maybe you know when FC "Left Bank" will return to professional football?
— According to the results of the last season, despite the fact that it was incomplete, the team won the right to play in the first division, but the club president Mykola Lavrenko was very angry that some coaches and players, being scared, did not return from the Turkish training camp in Ukraine when it started war, and suspended the team's activities. I hope that he will leave little by little, decide on a coach and bring back the team that has saved a place in the PFL.
You are right, we have a real football paradise in Osokorki. It so happened that Mykola Lavrenka and I are neighbors, and our meeting five years ago began to bring such results. Recently, at the opening of the stadium, where UPL matches and international competitions of youth, youth and women's national teams can be held, I did not have the opportunity to say a word on behalf of the players, parents of our children, club administration and our fans. And they sound like this - we are all looking forward to Mykola Lavrenko applauding his players from the VIP stand of the new arena, demanding a penalty or canceling a goal.
However, no one yet knows what the president himself thinks about this. Maybe now he can't make a coach choice because I don't want to make another mistake. It was I who recommended Anatoly Buznyk to him. As a specialist, he fulfilled his task, but due to family circumstances, he did not appear at the workplace when the war began. This is a personal choice of everyone, currently many people act in such a way that it will be possible to evaluate their behavior only later...
Be that as it may, but it seems to me that we will have a team. A club with such an infrastructure must play at a professional level, and I am sure that soon "Left Bank" will be in the UPL. I don't know exactly when, but he will be there.
Yuriy Denisenko
