On Sunday, December 8, in the match of the 16th round of the Ukrainian championship, Kyiv’s “Dynamo” defeated “Alexandria” with a score of 3:0. The match took place in Kyiv at the Valeriy Lobanovskyi Dynamo Stadium. Here is the post-match press conference of the guest team’s head coach Ruslan Rotan.
Ruslan Rotan. Photo — Yu. Yuriev— Congratulations to “Dynamo” on the victory and I wish the team success in the Europa League. This success is needed by all of us. We support all Ukrainian clubs in European competitions.
Regarding today’s game, it turned out to be double-edged for our team. The match could have turned out differently had we scored first. But we conceded a non-logical goal. Unfortunately, we have the mentality of a mid-level team which does not react properly to mistakes and everything collapses.
We gave “Dynamo” space and the opportunity to play on counterattacks, and they took advantage of it. We allowed the opponent to play their football.
— How many points did you plan to earn in the two matches against “Dynamo”?
— This is football. Points must be earned through your game and dedication at 100%. We understood the importance of today’s match in terms of points. And we set ourselves up for it as if it were a victory. But “Dynamo” is of a higher class, they seized their opportunities by utilizing the space. And we, on the contrary, failed to capitalize on our moments.
We need to work, change the mentality of a mid-level team: react differently to mistakes which will always happen. Mistakes are a part of football, there is nothing wrong with that. The main thing is to understand the essence of these mistakes and draw the right conclusions. But today we had agony. We began to take a lot of the game into our own hands.
— Did the agony you speak of start already after the first conceded goal, or still after the second?
— After the first. We had a strong desire to equalize, but our skill and correct recognition of game situations let us down. We were doing the opposite of what we practiced. We want to receive space and use it, but we did everything the other way around, making some difficult passes, striving to equalize the score as quickly as possible.
Football consists of positional play, counterattacks, and what is called preparatory play. Unfortunately, we forgot about the last of these aspects after the first goal.
— Halfway through the championship, your team was in first place. Did you get used to it?
— It was very pleasant. (Smiles). We had a huge desire to stay on Dynamo's heels for as long as possible. Only in direct matches with the Kyiv team would it be decided who is currently stronger. It turned out to be “Dynamo”. This must be acknowledged and we wish our today's opponent success.
But we will not give up. Nothing terrible has happened. There is nothing to react negatively to. I repeat, it is necessary to change the mentality. There should be a different reaction to one’s own mistakes. Then we will become even better.
Post-match press conference of Dynamo’s head coach Oleksandr Shovkovskyi
Oleksandr POPOV from the Valeriy Lobanovskyi Dynamo Stadium
