FC Dynamo Kyiv head coach Oleksandr Shovkovskyi answered media questions before the Europa League matchday 3 game against AS Roma.
- Dynamo have second best attack in the UPL, but haven’t scored in the Europa League yet. How come?
- You should understand what’s happening in our country. We should thank the authorities, our President, for their strong-willed decision to allow the league to be held in the country where war is happening. Today, all our teams have problems with finances, logistics, and also with attracting skillful foreign players, which adds certain negative consequences to the quality of football that we wanted to show both in the domestic league and on the international arena.
The Europa League is the second best tournament after the Champions League, where teams play, which, on the one hand, are losers, since they did not make it to the Champions League, and on the other hand, they play at a very high level, almost always participating in European competitions. In this regard, if we’re talking about football in Ukraine, we’re talking about survival, and if we’re talking about international tournaments, we need to look only forward and understand that today we’re gaining some experience and doing everything in our power to grow and reach, for example, the level of the Serie A, which is among the top five leagues in Europe.
Therefore, I believe this is a very important experience for us, these are important matches for us, which give us the opportunity to see our level and do everything possible to grow, playing against teams that, let’s be honest, are at the top level. I hope that the war in our country will end, and we will be able to develop and do everything in our power to catch up with European football and do everything possible to bring football in our country to a higher level.
- Which players won’t be able to take the field tomorrow?
- You’ll find out when you see our lineup. Andrii Yarmolenko, Oleksandr Pikhalionok, Volodymyr Shepelev and Brayan Ceballos definitely won’t be able to play.
- What are your impressions of Roma match against Inter?
- They got a new gaffer recently. Although they don’t score a lot in domestic league, they don’t concede a lot either. Roma shoot on goal frequently which means they want to play fast attacking football. They score in the second half a lot which means they don’t have fitness issues. The game against Inter was even. The defender’s mistake was decisive as he slipped. But Roma had some decent chances as well. Obviously Dovbyk increased their attacking options range. I totally understand we’ll have a tough game against the team representing one of the top European leagues. We’ll do our best to use our chances.
