Yuriy Moroz, head coach of the Ukraine U-17 national team, commented on the1-3 defeat to the Czech Republic in the second match at the 2024 European Championships.
Yuriy Moroz"We planned that there was nowhere to retreat, we only needed a victory. I don't understand what happened. Children's football, children's psyche, burned out... The guys did not show all their strength on the field, what they can do. They lost many battles, made many individual mistakes, and lost the ball in simple situations.
In the episode with the first goal, we didn't take the ball out, made a mistake, and brought this penalty to ourselves. Then the guys seemed to get their act together, some moments went well, something started to work. But for each game in the final part, you need to get ready to have the moral and fighting qualities. On the one hand, reaching the final tournament is already a success, they are great. However, at the championship itself, you need to play differently.
The performance of our boys in different clubs? Perhaps this is also one of the reasons for the failure. You can look for different reasons, but in my opinion, there was no anger or thirst for victory on the football field. You need to fight on every patch of the pitch, and in the episode with the third goal, one player beat so many opponents...
Everyone was on equal terms, but we did not work hard enough. Perhaps we gave too many advances, talked about the future. I'll say this: the guys are great for reaching the final. And here everyone is trying hard, they know how to play football.
I did not expect such a game, I thought it would be a little better. But we have what we have at the moment. As for the squad for the match with Cyprus, we will look at the condition of the players and think about how to make sure we have a combat-ready team for this match," said Yuriy Moroz.
