Journalist Mykhailo Spivakovsky commented on the elimination of the Ukrainian national team from Euro 2024.
Photo: uefa.com"We slammed the door with dignity. But who will look after us?
1. During the break, instructor Tedescu popularly explained to his boy scouts the dangers of playing on the water. And the Belgians realized that the ball would not caress itself.
2. Our team gave up possession and at some point forgot what the ball looked like so much that they started throwing it like a Frisbee on the beach. Tymchyk brought a dangerous moment for Lukaku, but then rehabilitated himself by thwarting Belgium's second chance.
3. Rebrov took off into the future to make sure that the Romanians and Slovaks were good guys, but not their own enemies. And exactly at the 70th minute, he threw a delta team - Stepanenko, Malinowski, Vanat - into the battle.
That was Plan B. Our guys started biting the devils' calves again.
4. We had some half-moments, but they were too inconsistent. The belief that Dovbyk could not help but score three matches in a row began to evaporate. Rebrov counted down another ten minutes and replaced Svatko with Yarmolenko.
And that was plan B - all-in! Malinowski could and should have been the hero, who - if we evaluate the quality of thought - scored two goals. The first one was a shaving "dry sheet" from a corner. The second with a cannonball from the halfway line. But goalkeeper Castells and ex-teammate Kastan got in the way of the ball.
The latter at the cost of a knockdown.
5. Ukraine was eliminated in the most unfortunate of all possible tournament situations.
Not that it went down in history, but rather that it got into a bit of trouble. Yes, the team was objectively improving its condition and quality of play with each match. But the starting point was so low that it was impossible to climb out.
Yes, we slammed the door with dignity. But honestly, who will look after us?
Let's be honest: you can't go into the playoffs losing to the weakest team in the group 0:3. You can't be competitive if you are frankly weak both in the press and under pressure.
Our team is too raw for great things. But it has the deepest hidden reserve.
But that's bullshit. I just want to end on something positive," TaToTake quoted Spivakovsky as saying.
