Former Ukrainian national team forward Ivan Getsko shared his impressions of the Euro 2024 qualifying match England - Ukraine (2:0).
- What is there to comment on? England scored two goals and just stopped, played to keep the score. And I saw nothing in Ukraine's performance, especially in the attack. If there was any control of the ball, then in the attack - a complete failure.
How can we talk about the progress of soccer, if we say that Rotan offers us a lot of soccer, but in the output - no goalscoring, no combinations, no standards? During the whole game Malinovskyy never once found an opportunity to hit the ball on goal. And this is a player of the attacking plan, who plays in one of the top championships.
I'm not even talking about Mudryk and other players who cost millions, and we all saw the result, or rather the complete absence of it. Yes, somewhere else we saw the level of Zinchenko from the good side, and that's it. One or two players can not change the game structure of the whole team. The ball was always given to the back, across the front, there was no sharpness.
- Were the starting lineup surprising? In particular, the appearance of Yaremchuk, who is not going through the best period in his career or Sudakov instead of Tsygankov, who after moving to "Girona" actually got his second breath? Other players?
- Two players did not fit into the starting lineup. This is Yaremchuk, who today, as you have already noted, is not in great shape, who had not even a single moment in two halves - not to the point of having a half-chance. And the second player - Karavaev. How was it possible in the moment with Kane's goal not to play the ball. The latter gives a pass from the center of the field, runs to the end, a cross to the far post, and as a result, he scored into an empty net. This is certainly alarming.
- Yarmolenko was not enough today with his experience and knowledge of English soccer?
- Andriy is a key player in the Ukraine national team when he is at his best and everything is good. And to invite Konoplyanka to the national team, who, in fact, does not play in Poland now - there are a lot of questions here, too. Yes, England did a lot of defense, blocked areas, we know the level of this team. And, nevertheless, not a single chance in two halves is, to put it mildly, wrong. And the English did not try hard at all. Nobody took the ball from us, as they say. And our rare attempts to create something ended with the Ukraine team losing the ball and counterattacking on their own goal.
Let me repeat - we need a core around which the whole team will play. And that backbone is nowhere near there. One or two players do not save the situation. What we had today did not look like a qualifying game. It was more like a friendly match of veterans. You look, people play in European clubs, but you can`t even see the adequate level. In the best case, the average. On the other hand - what do we want? One is injured, the other is recuperating, the third is not ready, in his club he played only seven minutes, and so on. There will be excuses everywhere. But the logical question then is why do we need these players? We have normal players, in good shape, who have constant practice in our championship. So put them on, let them prove and show what they can do. In any case they will be more useful than foreign players, whose level of readiness leaves much to be desired.
Yes, everyone understands what a difficult situation our country and our citizens are in now, soccer is not in the first place. However, in this situation there are players who play abroad, no one makes any super demands to them, they are not burdened with all those worries which those who live in Ukraine have. So, in theory, this should also have some effect on the quality of the game.
- Prospects for the Ukraine national team in the current qualifying round?
- We must determine the coach who is really interested to build something with this team. We have the material, but it must be put together into one whole, and we are inviting a man who currently has a lot of problems - with "Aleksandriya" and with the "youth". We need a man who will invest in this work in the most serious way and try to do something. Italy is going through a real fever right now and it is quite possible to pass it. But not with a game like today, when there were no shots on goal.
Rebrov? Apparently, everything is going to happen. We just have to believe and hope that Sergey Stanislavovich will do well and he will really change something.
Yevgeniy Savchuk