Famous coach and now expert Oleg Fedorchuk shared his expectations for the first match of the 2nd qualifying round of the Europa League between Turkish "Beşiktaş" and Donetsk "Shakhtar":
Photo: shakhtar.comThe "miners" performed confidently in the last round of the competition, which is very important during the team’s restructuring under a new head coach. "Beşiktaş," although a prominent team, is, in my opinion, in crisis for the second year in a row. The Istanbul side is performing extremely poorly for the authority of their championship. It’s enough to say that last season they dropped points in 19 out of 36 matches, while the gap from the champion "Galatasaray" was 33 points. Therefore, I believe that "Shakhtar" has a chance and quite a good one.
However, there is one nuance; the Turkish team is led by former Manchester United striker Ole Gunnar Solskjær. This specialist is looking for players who run a lot and are resilient. It will be a battle of opponents with different styles of play. Although "Shakhtar" and "Beşiktaş" have some similarities. Both teams have a practically equal number of foreign players in their squads, only the "miners" are slightly younger. The Ukrainian team also had a disappointing last season. In general, two "sick" clubs will meet, but only one will advance further," said Fedorchuk.
