Donetsk Shakhtar’s head coach Arda Turan commented on his team’s overwhelming victory over Kyiv’s Obolon (6:0) in yesterday’s match of the 13th round of the Ukrainian championship.
Arda Turan. Photo — shakhtar.com— Obolon has already established itself this season and in past years as an opponent capable of causing problems for many top-tier teams, especially when they play at home. Therefore, I am very pleased with how the game went in the first half — if I’m not mistaken, we only allowed one shot on our goal. Also, the goal at the end of the first half was very important.
The second goal, scored at the beginning of the second half, gave us special confidence. Of course, it did not decide the match completely, because, as I emphasized, the opponent knows how to create significant problems when playing at home, but naturally, this goal made the continuation of the game easier for us. Even after that, it could have been somewhat difficult for us, but the subsequent goals simplified our task in this confrontation. I am really pleased with how my players are improving from match to match, and today I want to express my sincerest compliments and praise to them.
After the red card and the opponent’s expulsion, when it was already 3:0, we tried to some extent to preserve the current score and our players for the future, as there are many away games ahead. This will be the last playing month of the calendar year, and we are expecting many journeys and generally some difficult matches. Therefore, our victory is very important both in the context of continuing to build our confidence and in general — to have a better foundation for concluding this year.
Could I have anticipated such a crushing victory before the match? No, I couldn’t. As I emphasized, I am convinced that Obolon is indeed a very quality team with decent performance on the football field. Yes, we expected to play at our best, but we ourselves didn’t anticipate playing so well, said Turan.
