Minaya defender Dmitry Nemchaninov commented on the team's victory over Metalist 1925 in the 19th round of the Ukrainian championship.
Dmitry Nemchaninov. Photo by Dmytro Rudenko"By and large, there were, as they say, six points at stake. The victory allowed the "citizens" to return to the chase for a place in the elite, while the Kharkiv team was moving away from the relegation zone. Therefore, there were no problems with motivation.
Back in the day, Minaya's coach Željko Ljubenović started his coaching career at Zorya when it was led by the current Metalist 1925 coach. Of course, the Serbian specialist had information about Viktor Skrypnyk's favourite tactical schemes. Therefore, we were prepared, in particular, for the guests' use of the diamond in the middle zone, we knew how to counteract it. There were other home-grown developments. But the main thing is that, as the 18th round match between Dnipro-1 and Minaj has already shown, thanks to Zhelko Lyubenovych, there have been changes in the psychology of our players, we have regained confidence in ourselves.
I believe that today Minaj deservedly won. We are well aware that we have no time to rest on our laurels, that we have 13 finals ahead of us and no room for error. However, I am glad that our tournament position is no longer hopeless," said Dmitry.
