On 28 July, the 33rd Ukrainian football championship will start. This is the 20th championship, in which 16 clubs will take part. In the first part of the season will be held 17 rounds, in the second, spring - 13. The final 30th round of the Premier League is scheduled for 18 May 2024.
After a one-year break, the Ukrainian Cup, which has been held 13 times by Dynamo Kyiv, resumes. Matches of the 1/16 finals are scheduled for 16 August. The winner of the Cup should be determined on 25 May.
Among the 16 participants of the championship 2 debutants. For the first time in the Premier League will play "Polesie" (Zhytomyr), and LNZ (Cherkassy). After 11 years in it returned "Obolon" (Kyiv).
Metalist and Lviv said goodbye to the top league. "Veres" defended its right to stay in the UPL in a dispute with the first league "Metallurg" (Zaporizhzhya) (0:1 and 6:1). "Ingulets" flew to the first league, losing to LNZ (1:1 and 1:2).
About the 32nd national championship
All its matches were held with empty stands. The tournament lasted 285 days. In 240 matches of the championship 587 goals were scored. Shakhtar won the title of Ukrainian champion for the 14th time, Dnipro-1 became the silver medallist for the first time, Zorya won the bronze medals for the fourth time.
The best players have been named
The Ukrainian Premier League, following a poll of representatives of their clubs, named Patrick van Leeuwen, Zorya's coach, as the best coach of the season. In the voting he beat Igor Jovicevych, who was in charge of Shakhtar.
Jovicevic, having taken over the team before the start of the season, immediately won the Ukrainian championship with it and did it convincingly. Despite this, the club management and its president Rinat Akhmetov offered the head coach to leave the club. Jovicevych was not left without a job. He immediately received an offer to head one of the clubs in Saudi Arabia - Al-Raed. Patrick van Leeuwen, who previously worked at FC Shakhtar in 2008-2013 as the head of the club's football academy, became Shakhtar's head coach.
Roman Grigorchuk rounded off the top three coaches of the 32nd championship. Chornomorets, led by him, finished 9th in the league. Viktor Skrypnyk "Vorskla" and Oleksandr Kucher "Dnipro-1" were in the top 5.
The best referee of the season-2022/23 representatives of UPL clubs for the 3rd time named Ekaterina Monzul. In the championship she worked at 16 matches. She showed 58 yellow and 10 red cards. A tough woman, but is she always objective? Vitaly Romanov was named second in this poll. The third place was shared by Anatoliy Abdula and Yaroslav Kozik.
The best scorer of the championship with 24 goals scored in 30 matches was Artem Dovbik "Dnipro-1".
For the second time without medals
FC Dynamo is the 16-time champion of Ukraine, 12-time silver medallist, 1 bronze medallist. In this championship the wards of Romanian coach Mircea Lucescu "flew" past the podium for the second time in the history of Ukrainian championships. The first time it happened when the club was headed by Oleh Blokhin.
In the 30 matches held, the Kyivians achieved 18 victories, 6 matches were drawn and 6 lost. 60 points are in the Dynamo's asset. This is 12 points less than Shakhtar, Dnipro-1 and Zorya are 7 points ahead of Dynamo.
Dynamo scored 49 goals against their opponents, plus 2 auto-goals from the opponents' legs, while conceding 25 goals. In 19 games Kyiv goalkeepers kept their gates "dry". 12 times each Vitaliy Buyalskyi and Vladislav Vanat upset the opponents' goalkeepers. Vitaliy played 27 games, Vladyslav - 25. 35 Dynamo players took part in the championship matches, 15 of them scored goals.
As the hosts of the field, in 15 matches Dynamo players won 7 victories, 4 matches were drawn and 4 matches were lost, they scored 25 points.
In away games Dynamo players felt more confident. In 15 games they won 11 times, 2 matches ended in a draw and in 2 matches they suffered defeats. They scored 35 points, which is the best result among all teams participating in the championship.
I want to believe that soon the matches of the Ukrainian championship will again be held with fans in the stands. And then at the games with Dynamo participation we will hear not only "Putin is a d...o...o", but also the charges that sounded in the past years:
A child was born, he opened his eyes and the first word - "Dynamo" from Dnipro!
It is easier to scatter mountains than to beat Dynamo!
A dog loves meat, a crow loves cheese, and I love Dynamo, Dynamo is my idol!
We wish you Dynamo more victories in the new football season and look forward to the third star above your emblem.
Oleksandr LIPENKO for Dynamo.kiev.ua
