Dnipro-1 head coach Yuriy Maksymov shared his memories of Dynamo Kyiv's Serhiy Rozhko, who recently died in the war.
Yurii Maksymov. Photo - scdnipro1.com.ua"I was shocked to learn that Serhiy had died. The heroes who defend our country are leaving. He was a great guy. I met him when I was heading Obolon. Rozhok helped us get into the top flight. Then I went to Kryvbas and took Serhii with me.
He was never a sycophant, had his own opinion and always told the truth. I am impressed by such people. On the pitch, he was a leader, he gave the guys suggestions, I never even made any comments to him. Serhii played as a centre-back and had a great left stick.
He was always calm and decent in all respects, with a great sense of humour. I remember an interesting story. Rozhok had a son, and our goalkeeping coach, whose name was Gena, asked: "Sergiy, what did you name your son? Gena, I hope?" Rozhok did not hesitate: "If he was born a crocodile, I would have named him Gena, but not Gena." We laughed for a long time.
He has such a character that he never wanted to be number one. Serhii was a hard worker on the pitch, but he never tried to suck up to the coaches to get a first team role somewhere. The man followed the right path in life," Ukrainian Football quoted Maksymov as saying.
