Yevhen Levchenko: "I don't think we will play like this against Slovakia or Romania"

Former Ukraine midfielder Yevhen Levchenko shared his impressions of the friendly match between Germany and Ukraine (0:0), which took place yesterday in Nuremberg.

"Overall, I have no negative impressions of the match. Everything we could do - we did. We didn't play with the first number one, if you look at our tactics. But this match gave a lot of positives and moments that gave us an understanding of where we need to add more.

We tried a slightly different system, where a few players played in slightly different positions. I think it was a test case for our coaches to test a few players, to see what we can do if we're facing a team that will press, make a lot of ground and do a lot of technical and tactical things like Germany.

I don't see any terrible moves. Some experts say we played quite closed and low - for me it's not such a problem. It's the variation that is very important for us. If we get out of the group, and I hope we have to put getting out of the group as our first priority, we need to be able to play both number one and number two.

I can't understand what criticism we can talk about when you play a friendly match. You have a very serious opponent, no matter what we say, and you have the opportunity to test the team once or twice in a different scheme. When better than now to test how we can play?

We could have conceded a few goals, yes, but we need to build on our capabilities. And when you have these players and you know that we can control the ball, we can play forward on Mudryk, we can get a little bit higher, then we have variability - and we can build on that. So I don't understand people criticizing the coaching staff for trying to do something different and see how we can play against the grands.

I don't think we will play like that against Slovakia or Romania. This match just shows what other system we can play in - a lot of examples when we played other opponents and there was a lot of ball control, movement, work. I saw how our guys all played both in attack and defense - look at Tsygankov and Mudryk, who worked both in defense and in attack. For me, this is a normal thing.

And there are only a few minuses: physical shape and these mistakes, which we just need to clean up, so as not to run behind the train," Levchenko said.