On Sunday, 26 November, in the match of the 15th round of the Ukrainian championship Dynamo Kyiv defeated Lviv Rukh with the score 2:0. The meeting took place in Kyiv at the Dynamo stadium named after Valeriy Lobanovskiy. Here is the post-match press conference of the head coaches of the teams.
Oleksandr SHOVKOVSKY, Dynamo acting head coach:
- I congratulate all Dynamo fans on the victory. Before the game we faced some problems. You have seen that Popov and Voloshin were not in our squad today. There were problems with Vanat, who came from the youth team with a small injury. Now he is fine, and he came on as a substitute, but his conditioning is not the best now, because he has not practically trained for four days.
In general, we solved our problems and prepared for the match. We realised that we had to play with a young ambitious team, which will surely build its game by pressing. In the first half, despite the fact that it ended with the score 2-0, we lost somewhere to the opponent. But after the break we corrected our mistakes, started to act more aggressively, we did not "sit" deep, we met the opponent "high". As a result, we brought the match to a victorious conclusion, although we had opportunities to increase the score.
- With Vivcharenko coming on as a substitute Dubinchak started to play on the right side of the attack. Comment on your decision.
- Today we had only two players who played in the position of wingers. And at some point I decided to make such a change in our formation, so that we did not lose speed.
- You were a goalkeeper for a long time, now you are a coach. Where do you spend more nerve cells: when you stand in goal, or when you manage the team's game?
- I did not stand in the goal, but played. Before every match players are nervous, and it is normal. But when they go on the field, they must fully focus on the coach's instructions and fully give themselves to the game, strive to maximise their potential. During the game, no one is nervous: everyone just plays. And the goalkeeper is no exception.
Now, of course, everything is different. I understand perfectly well when people compare the head coach's chair to the electric chair. But it's normal, you need to think with a cool head about the game itself, how to improve it, what adjustments to make, how to interact with the players so that they hear what is required of them and fulfil it.
- Evaluate Benito's game. Would he have played today if he had not had problems with Vanath?
- We have about 28-30 players in the team at all times. All of them are in the clip. They all train and, among other things, prepare to play different positions. We require them to understand what they need to do in this or that situation, on this or that part of the field.
Supriyaga is recovering from a serious injury. Vanat suffered an injury. Therefore, Benito played on this position today. We are well aware of the qualities of all our players and try to use them as best as possible.
And who will play is determined just before the match. Because we see the state of the players, we see in what condition they came from the national teams, we see how they train. The team is a living organism, which can have this or that face. But the players must understand the game plan, tactics, strategy and realise it on the pitch.
Vitaliy Ponomaryov, head coach of "Rukh":
- We are not satisfied with either the result or the quality of the game - this is one of our worst matches in this championship. We will analyse, correct the mistakes we made today.
The goals conceded are, first of all, the result of our gross mistakes. We require the goalkeeper to play with his feet. Gereta, of course, made a mistake, but no one will scold him for it. It's just a mistake.
I did not like the fact that we became psychologically weak after the first half. This is a problem, because we constantly inform the guys that we must play until the end, no matter what the result is. I can't say that we gave up in the second half, but there was no team play in our performance, there was no integrity.
Oleksandr POPOV from the Dynamo Stadium named after Valeriy Lobanovskiy
