Ivan Yaremchuk - about the defeat of the Ukraine national team from England: "An official match is not an exercise in holding th

The former midfielder of Kyiv Dynamo Ivan Yaremchuk shared his impressions about the match of the national team of Ukraine against England (0:2) in the qualifying round of Euro 2024, which was held yesterday in London.

- What kind of impressions can we talk about if our team had no shots on goal, no sharpness, no dangerous passes? What did we create in two halves? Nothing in particular. In soccer, everything depends on the creation and realization of chances. If there is no organization of the end in the organization of attacks, then you do not get a winning result.

You can only keep the ball in the middle of the field, hoping for a draw. But not more. England scored two goals, did their job - and then played at their own pace, not giving anything to our team. The opponents had secured the result - and nothing more was required.

- What do you see as the reason for the defeat?

- Unfortunately, we lacked something. I don't even know what exactly. One of the reasons, in my opinion - the non-optimal lineup. At the same time we should give credit to the opponent's level: England is England, it's a real machine.

- Do you think the fact that at the very beginning of the Euro 2024 qualification round Ukraine lost one of the main favorites - plus or minus in the strategic plan of the tournament?

- Of course, England is a favorite. However, Italy, despite the defeat from England in the first game, will play better in the other games and will fight to advance to the finals in the second position.

Either way, our team had to give their all at Wembley to prove they were worth anything. To give it their all and get at least a draw in England would have been nice. And so we saw a one-goal game... It's a shame that we`ve prepared for this match - and we got two goals in the first half. In the second half, the hosts actually finished the match.

However, despite the initial failure of Ukraine, it is too early to make any far-reaching conclusions, because everyone has a chance to fight for the exit from the group. The main thing is to use them. Take, for example, Kazakhstan's game against Denmark in another group. Who would have thought that the Kazakh team beat the Danes? But it picked up and won - 3:2.

So if we talk about the Ukrainian team, there is hope - and then we'll see. This is soccer - as they say, the ball is round and the field is green. In any case, we all hope that in the June games against Northern Macedonia and Malta our national team will give reason for positive expectations. To do this, the players need to give their best in every match, using their best qualities - to make passes, beat opponents individually one-on-one, create chances, hit the goal and score. An official game is not an exercise in holding the ball in practice.

Vyacheslav Kulchytskyy