Mykola Nesenyuk: "Dynamo's players are fine with their skills. There was not enough freshness"

Well-known journalist Mykola Neseniuk shared his impressions of the first match of the Champions League qualifying round between Dynamo Kyiv and Salzburg Austria (0:2), which took place yesterday in Lublin.

"The last time Dynamo played this kind of football was exactly two years ago. It was in Lodz, where Kyiv hosted Portuguese Benfica and lost 0:2. After that, the team did not have the opportunity to play at a similar level - what is played in our so-called "Premier League" is a slightly different sport, in which success requires completely different virtues than in real football.

That is why the game against Salzburg in Lublin had to answer the question of whether the current Dynamo players are ready to play football at the speed and intensity that they regularly play in European championships. This match was another step towards a really serious level.

And while the team passed the first stage in the face of the Serbian Partizan quite confidently, in the second stage, in the matches with Scottish Rangers, there were obvious problems that were eventually solved. In third place was Austrian Salzburg, a team that plays itself and lets the opponent play. We have virtually no such thing in Ukraine - Ukrainian teams, from amateur teams to the leaders of the national championship, do not play football so much as fight for the result. Our football is dominated by jostling - everyone is afraid of making a mistake. It looks like hard work, not a game.

In Lublin, the opponent let Kyiv play - Dynamo had more chances to score than in the previous game against Karpaty. But Dynamo scored three times there, while in Lublin they did not score a single goal. Why? Because the Austrian club, which is the world youth team, responded to every sharp attack of the opponent with an equally sharp one of its own. "Dynamo did not score their chances not because the players lacked skill. In my opinion, everything is fine with the skill. There was a lack of freshness - Kyiv's attacks were a response to the opponent's attacks, and having run twice across the field, it is not easy not to make a mistake at a crucial moment.

Having taken a two-goal lead in the second half, the Austrian team did not go into a blind defense, preserving the result by all means, but continued to threaten the Kyiv team's goal. Therefore, the score could have been either 2:2 or 0:4. This is what real football is, and Dynamo got the chance to play it two years later.

What is the conclusion? First, unlike the game the year before, there is no sense of hopelessness now. "Dynamo has shown that it can play real football. Whether the team can not only play at this level but also win is another question. We will get the answer to it in a week in Salzburg. And even though statistically Dynamo seems to have no chance, we should not lose hope. Because there will also be a game of football, not a struggle for a result. And in the game, anything is possible!" Neseniuk wrote on his Facebook page.