Jump to content

[FM18] - Lviving La Vida Loca (Paul Tilletson, Part 1)


he_2

Recommended Posts

PROLOGUE - THE BEGINNINGS

The word journey is often misapplied and certainly overused in my opinion. The Oxford English Dictionary defines the word 'journey' thus:

Journey: noun

1   1.  An act of travelling from one place to another

1   1.1 A long and difficult process of personal change and development

My own story certainly covers the first definition on many different occasions, yet it is the second definition which, whilst perhaps less obvious, I really feel applies to me.

We have to hark back to the heady pre-Brexit days of mid-summer 2017 for the beginning of the voyage which I’ve chosen to put on paper which began in the smartly turned-out but largely inauspicious surroundings of the Kryva Lypa hotel in the centre of Lviv, Ukraine.

That I wanted to become a manager after my playing days was no secret to anyone. Not my friends, family, ex-team-mates or the media. I’d long been a student of the game, or at least tried to be, and spent so much time seeking out people’s opinions on coaching, tactics, philosophies and different styles of playing around the world that single-minded probably didn’t do me justice. It was more a level of obsessiveness, a thirst for more and more information so that I could try and be the best coach, the best manager I possibly could be.

Speak to any of my old bosses (those that were any good, anyway) and they’ll tell you just how much of a ball-ache I became to them. Sure, they all humoured me and indulged my myriad and endless questions – many of them I’m sure, utterly stupid – but without their input and that of many of my later contemporaries, I wouldn’t have been able to have enjoyed even a fraction of the career in the dugout that I have.

With the English game such a pressure-cooker, I made the decision to seek my first job somewhere a little different, somewhere off the beaten track and away from the media spotlight. That my appointment as manager of newly promoted Ukranian second-tier side Rukh Vynnyky attracted no more than a couple of short paragraphs ‘on the news-wires’ suited me just perfectly. As I put pen to paper in the hotel café on a one-year contract to lead Rukh into their inaugural season at this level, I took a moment to reflect on what it was that had brought me to Ukraine and Eastern Europe as a whole.

Some of you reading this may be aware of the 2012 book by esteemed football writer, Jonathan Wilson, Behind the Curtain, in which Wilson talks about how he was seduced as a youngster by Eastern European football and, in particular, the Red Star side that won the European Cup in 1991. I was 10 then and don’t really recall that Red Star side which pre-dated the break-up of the country that was once called Yugoslavia although many of the names are familiar. Vladimir Jugovic, Dejan Savicevic, Darko Pancev and Robert Prosinecki, who I later briefly played alongside at Portsmouth, all went on to excel in western Europe at some of Europe’s biggest clubs.

My own introduction into the wonderful, slightly mystical world of Eastern European football came after the fall of the Berlin Wall and Communism in the Eastern-bloc. In 1994, Gheorghe Hagi and Hristo Stoichkov had wowed the world with their astonishing talents as Romania reached the quarter-finals and Bulgaria the last four of the World Cup in America. Like Hagi and Stoichkov, I was heavily left-footed, I was often described as mercurial and I had wonderfully thick eyebrows. That, though, is where any comparison must lie for although I won 28 caps for England, I probably didn’t fulfil the prodigious talent that many observers of me as a youngster thought that I had.

After that, there was the brilliant Dynamo Kyiv side of the late 90s which included Sergei Rebrov and Andriy Shevchenko at its head and which was the final great team constructed by the legendary Valeriy Lobanovskiy. I remember watching them playing Arsene Wenger’s superb Arsenal side off the park at home and away in the Champions League with performances of such technical and tactical beauty that I was utterly mesmerised. Seduced, even.

Whilst I readily admit that I attached a certain degree of romance to my view of Eastern European football, it’s one that stayed with me through the Russian adventure to the semi-finals of Euro 2008, the Croatia of Modric, Krancjar, Corluka and co, Slovenia’s 4-3 thriller against Yugoslavia at Euro 2004 - even finding a perverse beauty in Ukraine’s largely tedious 0-0 draw with Switzerland in the knockout stages of the 2006 World Cup. Something about it tended to nail me.

The chance to manage Vynnyky came about through a conversation with Dmitri Kharine when I’d gone to watch Hemel Hempstead Town playing in a National League South match whilst doing a spot of scouting for Oxford United in April 2017. The former Chelsea and Russia keeper, Dimi, was the goalkeeping coach at the Tudors, and had been at Celtic at the turn of the Millenium when I spent a couple of months at Parkhead on-loan from Tottenham as a raw 20-year old. We got talking after the game for half an hour and I mentioned that I was thinking of looking to get into management for the following season. Half-jokingly, I said that if he knew of anyone back home looking for a rookie boss to let me know.

In actual fact, I was in talks to take over at a Southern League club in the South-West of England for the 2017/8 season at that stage but that would only happen if a planned takeover of the club was successful. It transpired a couple of months later after countless delays that the consortium’s business plan for the club was little more than pie in the sky fantasy and that the proposed new owners, supposedly backed by investors from the far east, didn’t have two farthings to rub together.

In light of that and thankfully, Dimi took me at my word as about 10 weeks later he’d rung to put me in touch with an agent in Ukraine who was acting on behalf of Rukh to find someone suitable to lead them into the unknown, their first season in the second tier. I spoke to the agent who I only knew as Vasiliy and he filled me in a little on the club, the job and offered to speak to the club President. Whilst I was always sceptical of agents, and would remain so over the years, Dmitri was able to vouch for Vasiliy and so, with nothing to be gained with venturing a little, I agreed to him putting my name forward.

The meeting took about three weeks to set up but, when it did I met Grygoriy Kozlovskyi, the president of Rukh and as he interviewed me (thankfully his English was far better than my non-existent Ukrainian!), I asked him a little more about the club’s structure, it’s aims and the plan for the next few years. I’ll give him his due, he was honest – disarmingly so – and laid bare the club’s insecurities.

In short, the club had come a long way in a short period of time. Originally formed in 2003 as a place for the town’s youth to play football, the adult branch of the club came into being six years later. A town with a population of around 16,000 and only 20km east of the city of Lviv, Vynnyky couldn’t exactly be described as a footballing hotbed. Averaging about 270 in their promotion season from the third tier, Kozlovskyi expected a slight increase on that with a higher level of football but admitted that ‘most locals either support Dynamo or Shakhtar and those that don’t tend to follow Karpaty.’ In any case, the ground itself could only hold 900. To describe it as primitive would be generous, but with an open-air main stand spanning the middle third of the pitch along one side and a little bit of space for standing spectators. Either end behind the goals was fenced off and the far side from the main stand also closed to supporters, it was a ground that would have struggled to be accepted in the 8th or 9th tier of English football.

Financially, the club was little better. Kozlovskyi said that he had been able to cobble together a weekly wage-bill which should be competitive and that he had been able to call in some favours from Dynamo and Shakhtar to bring in a couple of talented younger players to augment the squad but that there was absolutely no movement to be able to bring in any new faces at all. If I took the job, I would have to work with what I had. On top of that, if any player departed, unless it was of absolute necessity, the money saved on wages would simply go into making a small dent in the fiscal hole.

‘What are you aiming to achieve this season?’ I asked. ‘What would be the absolute best-case scenario?’

‘If we survive, that will be perhaps the best thing and the worst thing that can happen’ came the reply. I waited for him to continue. ‘The best because we have the chance to build a little more step by step and the worst because I don’t know how we can afford to do that.’

I came away from the meeting having given him an idea of my own vision, my own philosophy (admittedly coming from a blank canvas and knowing next to nothing about what I’d be working with if I got the job) with little hope of receiving the call. I’d tried not to sell him some utopian bull that might have come out of the mouth of Robbie Savage, but laid out my principles of having players comfortable in possession, having our first instinct to be playing on the front foot, taking on our opponents head on yet, being wary of overcommitting offensively, rarely pushing the full-backs any further on than 10 yards inside the opposition half.

The call did come. And very shortly afterwards too. In the time between the initial meeting and receiving the offer, I’d thought long and hard about whether to accept the job or not if I was deemed suitable. On one hand, the chance to manage somewhere where expectations were minimal – indeed, almost non-existent - was highly appealing. If I kept the side up, or at least gave it a good go, then my reputation was likely to be enhanced, at least within the Ukrainian footballing community and yet if it turned out that, actually I was fighting a losing battle then perhaps I wouldn’t be losing too much face by cutting and running early on.

The decision, when I made it, earned me a torrent of disbelieving WhatsApp messages from former team-mates and colleagues when the news broke that I’d taken the job. However, it was a decision that I’d able to provide within a heartbeat of being asked to make it in person. The contract talks lasted less than two minutes, the only sticking point was that I chose to negotiate Kozlovskiy down from his starting salary. I had no need for the money and anything saved could go towards plugging the deficit, but I wasn’t going to embarrass him and offer to work for nothing, so we agreed on a small nominal weekly sum and I put pen to paper.

Kozlovskyi had impressed me – he was a genuine man, a local boy made good and a self-made success who wanted to give something back to his home town. I wanted to see if I could help him along with his dream of building something for the local community to be proud of in Vynnyky.

The journey had begun.

 

Link to post
Share on other sites

An opening post that not only presents me with an intriguing and believable character, but also references both Jonathan Wilson and Valeriy Lobanovskiy and is set in a former Soviet nation? That might be a full house - I'll be following along with great interest. Excellent start, and I'm looking forward to seeing where you take this.

Link to post
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, EvilDave said:

An opening post that not only presents me with an intriguing and believable character, but also references both Jonathan Wilson and Valeriy Lobanovskiy and is set in a former Soviet nation? That might be a full house - I'll be following along with great interest. Excellent start, and I'm looking forward to seeing where you take this.

Thanks very much, EvilDave. Really appreciate that! I'm on my 10th season of the save and think there's a fair tale to be told here!

Link to post
Share on other sites

1.       Ukrainian First League: Kolos Kovalivka v Rukh Vynnyky (8th July 2017)

 

There were 21 players that made up the first-team squad and I had about ten days or so to work with them on the training pitch and try to get them to understand what I was hoping to achieve tactically. My skeleton coaching staff of Olexandr Drachenko, my assistant, and goalkeeping coach Vsevlod (I still haven’t worked out the pronunciation!) Romanenko spoke little English and my Ukrainian, as I’ve said, was equally lacking, but with the help of a combination of crosses and arrows on paper, sign language and semaphore signals, I think I managed to get them on board with what I had concocted in my mind and it seemed, from what I could understand, that we might have the personnel to give it a darned good try.

I’ve spoken about how I was heavily influenced in my formative years by eastern European football and eastern European footballers, and whilst I was very keen to maintain that identity, tactically I wanted to try and create something a little different. Technique, possession and everything that you expect when thinking about football from the old communist bloc would still very much be to the fore, however I wanted to try and add a bit of a British element to the mix as well.

That said, one of the finest exponents of the plan that I wanted to implement was in fact, Ukrainian. The 1994 double-winning Manchester United team was one of the most exciting I’ve ever seen. Of course, there’s every chance that my view of them has been coloured by time and the fact that I watched them as a 13-year old, but it had everything. A brilliant goalkeeper in Peter Schmeichel, two full-backs that liked to get forward in Paul Parker and Denis Irwin, robust centre-halves in Steve Bruce complemented by a more elegant one in Gary Pallister. Two genuine box-to-box players in midfield in Paul Ince and Roy Keane and the complimentary, yet very different styles of Mark Hughes and Eric Cantona up-front.

The key though, for me (and I’m sure that others will disagree with me) were the wide men. The wingers, Ryan Giggs (or sometimes Lee Sharpe) and Andrei Kanchelskis. I lost count of the number of times that Kanchelskis, in particular, used to burn up the opposition left back and either cut inside to shoot (more often than not scoring), or going on the outside and getting a cross in. Giggs, on the opposite flank, would more often turn the full-back inside out before going outside and whipping the ball in – their styles were different but utterly thrilling.

It was this element that I wanted to try and emulate.

I realised straight away that I was perhaps living in cloud cuckoo land, seduced by a fantasy, a utopia that was unachievable. But, I didn’t really like playing with one-man up front as a player, and whilst I can see the benefit of having inside forwards or wing-backs bombing up the line, I liked a good old fashioned 4-4-2, or a variant there-of.

Training was all focused on what to do with and without the ball, how we should set up defensively when faced with opponents that employed a 3-man midfield which would, in theory, leave us outnumbered in the centre of the park. Also, how we would go about breaking down a side that might put men behind the ball or play with a 5-man defence. Slowly but surely, in amongst the understandable tedium felt by the players, they began to latch onto things. In those ten days we were able to test things out on the field once, in a pre-season friendly against Polish 5th tier side Hetman Zamosc, winning 1-0 thanks to a Svyatoslav Zubar goal.

A win was a win and a clean sheet was a clean sheet, positive signs if ever there were any. However, there wasn’t a lot of fluency in our attacking play with misplaced passes and overhit passes aplenty. As time wore on and the starting XI formed itself in my consciousness, it was based fully on what I’d witnessed in training. Knowing that training and matches are two very different disciplines – the number of guys I’d seen excel on the training pitch and then go missing in an eleven aside game was countless as was the number of guys that wouldn’t stand out in training but be the most reliable fellas during a match – I was a little loathed to rely on this for our opener on Saturday 8th July against Kolos of Kovalivka.

 

***

The weather was foul. Squally summer drizzle interspersed with heavier bouts of rain from the moment I awoke, right through the long coach trip to the outskirts of Kyiv and into the village of Kovalivka where Kolos played.

Kolos were embarking on their second campaign as a First League side having had a rise that made our own appear almost stationary by comparison. Formed as recently as 2012, they achieved promotion from the local amateur leagues in Kyiv in 2015 into the Second League which they then went onto win at the first attempt. Their first season in the second tier had seen them finish a creditable 5th place, 10 points outside the promotion play-off spots (2nd and 3rd), and 3 oints ahead of 6th.

They were an upwardly mobile club in every sense of the word with, it seemed, everything geared towards trying to go one better this time around. Everything, that is, except for the ground which, whilst more capacious than our own by almost double, was no more appealing to anyone but the most hardened purist, however upon arrival at the imaginatively titled Kolos Stadium (English translation for ease), it was obvious that they were a step ahead of us organisationally.

For a start, they had a full coaching team and an operations manager who greeted us off the bus and showed us where to go. The pitch was in much better condition than our own and the place just had a much more professional feel to it. Perhaps that was to be expected having had a season at that level already, however it brought home to me just what a challenge I had decided to undertake once again.

Whilst the boys went out to have a look at the pitch and get a feel for their surroundings, something they’d never done before but that I had found invaluable as a player. So, out they traipsed with hoods up against the inclement summer weather whilst I remained in the dressing room and wrote the starting line-up down on the white-board in the attacking 4-4-2 formation that I’d been drilling into them.

Olexandr Dyachenko

 

Vasyl Bilyi           Oleg Chepelyuk                Igor Duts              Mykhaylo Pysko

 

Yuriy Tkachuk ©              Nazhar Verbnyi

 

Maxym Grysyo                                                                                 Borys Baranets

 

Svyatoslav Zubar              Svyatoslav Kozlovskyi

 

That job done, I had a few minutes to myself. Closing the door to the dressing room to block out the hubbub from across the corridor, I sat down on the bench resting my head back against Dyachenko’s goalkeeping jersey, closed my eyes and exhaled deeply. The previous ten days had been such a whirlwind of information, a tumble dryer of emotions that I’d completely neglected myself and I could feel it beginning to catch up with me and starting to overwhelm. I just needed a minute away from the assessments of players’ technical, tactical and mental capabilities; a minute away from trying to ingest some key Ukrainian phrases to help me communicate with people in the local coffee shop right through to those I had been chosen to lead onto the football field; a minute away from the clatter and bluster of emotions that were making themselves known after moving away from England for the first time, away from family and friends. I just needed a minute to find myself in the moment, to acknowledge every one of those things I’d been battling with and file them away, to clear my mind of the anxieties that had enveloped every part of my being for ten days since taking the job and focus on where I was and what I was doing at that particularly moment in time.

Two minutes was all I’d required and two minutes was all it took for me to feel so much more relaxed than I’d been on the coach journey north. The feeling of being a tightly coiled spring had unwound. As the players returned to the dressing room, complaining about the conditions outside, I guessed, judging by their demeanour, I was gently kicking a practice ball against far wall. Left foot, then right foot, then left foot, then right foot.

I don’t know why, but I carried on doing this whilst the boys sat down and waited, increasingly quiet. Maybe for a minute, maybe for two minutes I don’t know, I didn’t count. Once I’d finished, I held the ball up and pointed at it.

“Druh,” I said. One single word, one individual syllable. “Friend.”

 I threw the ball at Dyachenko who, thankfully, showed admirable reactions and caught it in a textbook manner before pointing at the home dressing room door, visible through our own which had been left open.

“Voroh!” I said this time, again the one single word albeit with double the syllables. “Foe!”

I ended my first ever team-talk by opening my arms wide and holding the stare, one by one, of each of the men sat looking at me.

“Udachi!” “Good luck!”

With a wink and a smile, I went around the room and shook each man by the hand leaving Olexandr Drachenko to deliver a bit more detail than my three-word version of the Gettysburg address. I stood and watched, glancing at my watch every so often. Still forty minutes before kick-off. Once Drachenko had finished his five-minute precis on what we were looking for tactically, we let the boys get changed ahead of the warm up.

***

That last five minutes before the referee pressed his buzzer seemed interminable. The boys were a frenzy of action taping their socks, applying Vaseline here and there, nervously tying and re-tying their boots. The clatter of studs on the tiled floor reverberated and made me think back to my professional debut, for Leyton Orient in a Division 2 game against Notts County and when I was sitting quietly as those more experienced guys around me, many of them seasoned journeymen fussed around with their pre-match routines. I never had one, I didn’t hold with superstitions, but I do remember that even then I hadn’t felt especially nervous. We drew, 1-1, and I’d done okay, but the biggest memory I had of the day was how sanguine I’d felt before the game.

That wasn’t the case this time. Then I had the innocence and ignorance of youth very much on my side, now I knew a lot more and knowledge wasn’t necessarily power. I wanted so badly for the buzzer to go, for the boys to troop out into the corridor, queued behind the three match officials and for the action to finally start. See whether I was going to sink or swim as a manager – in the short term, anyway.

BUZZZZ

At last! I clapped my hands enthusiastically as the boys got to their feet and opened the door. ’Come on, boys!’ I exclaimed in English, shaking each one by the hand as they traipsed out, shouts of encouragement and motivation passing up and down the line of red shirted men. Once they’d disappeared down the tunnel and out onto the field of play, I picked my jacket from the peg it had been left to hang on, folded it over my forearm and followed them to take my place on the bench for the first time.

***

The writing for us was on the wall as early as the 10th minute when a run from deep by the Kolos attacking midfielder Vladylsav Nekhtiy was spotted by Olexandr Pozdeev but not a red-shirted player and he was left clear on goal inside the penalty area within a touch. His shot beat Olexandr Dyachenko right enough but was unfortunate to see the ball rebound off the base of the post before being hacked away to safety by Mykhaylo Pysko. The chance had been the culmination of an opening spell where we’d largely been left to chase shadows, mis-place passes and hurry clearances.

It was a let off. Yet the reprieve just lasted 66 seconds.

A Nekhtiy corner was headed clear by Olexandr Chepelyuk yet only as far as Yuriy Solomka outside the penalty area. With no red shirt facing him, he pushed the ball down the left and hooked a cross towards the far post where it was met with a towering header by Olexandr Bondarenko which beat the hopelessly exposed Dyachenko and crashed down over the line off the underside of the crossbar. There were three red shirts in the vicinity of the Kolos striker yet none of them deigned to make even a token challenge. It was a crushingly disappointing way to concede.

We were almost facing a mountain rather than a molehill not 90 seconds later when one of our free kicks mid-way inside the Kolos half was cleared and led to a swift counter-attack from the home side. This time Nekhtiy returned the favour for Pozdeev and whilst his effort from just inside the penalty area once again beat Dyachenko all ends up, this time it was the crossbar which did come to our aid and this time, thankfully, Borys Baranets was on hand to hoick the ball to safety.

We were at sixes and sevens, if not eights and nines all across the park. As the first half reached the halfway point it was Dyachenko that came between Kolos and that second goal. Chepelyuk was closed down quickly by Bondarenko on the edge of our penalty area, slipped and left the goalscorer of the opening goal clean through. Dyachenko stood up well, made himself big and managed to make an excellent – and vital – block to keep us alive. We were little more than a twitching corpse at this point, but whilst a corpse does continue to twitch, there is always hope of life.

Bondarenko then shot wide on the half hour mark when he should have hit the target, being fed by a neat ball from the influential Nekhity, who then received a pass from Bondarenko three minutes later before also shooting badly wide when well placed. Still 1-0 behind and it could – should – have been 5.

We managed to get a bit of a foothold in the game in the final dozen or so minutes of the period. A couple of tame efforts from distance showed that there was a degree of offensive intent in our plan and the back four began to settle down after a worryingly nervous first half an hour or so.

At the break, I tried to urge the boys on, to make it known that at 1-0 we were still in the game, we just needed a little more from every single one of them. I encouraged, I cajoled – all in English aside from the handful of Ukrainian of phrases that I’d been given in my language lessons. I didn’t know if the players understood, they sat there largely implacable and with inscrutable expressions on their faces.

Drachenko took over and still there was very little reaction from those that were to go back out and do battle with our hosts.

As the buzzer went and they stood up, discarding drinks bottles and pulling up socks, I stood by the door to give each man a pat on the back or shoulder as they exited and returned into the arena, hoping that somehow, they’d taken something on board and that they were going to get back into the game.

The second period was much scrappier and disjointed than the first half had been from Kolos’ point of view and to be honest, that suited me alright. The longer we kept them at 1-0, the more chance of nerves setting in amongst the home team and we might, somehow, manage to nick an unlikely equaliser. We still looked toothless in the first half an hour once we got into the final third, however we had been able to put a bit of possession together, we had a bit more shape and structure about us and that gave me some hope that perhaps I wasn’t as out of my depth as I thought I might have been at the interval.

That illusion was shattered thoroughly with 12 minutes remaining when, with the first clear opening of the period Kolos netted their second of the afternoon. Substitute Yaroslav Vyshnyak’s opening touch of the afternoon was to pick up a pass from Maxym Maymenko about 25 yards from goal in the inside right area. He floated a neat ball towards the far post where Solomka headed back into the heart of the penalty area and Bondarenko was able to plant a super looping header over and beyond Dyachenko from 10 yards into the far top corner to make it 2-0.

2-0 and what was clearly an unassailable lead. My head was in my hands and those insecurities and doubts were flooding through my mind once again.

The concession of that second goal finally seemed to spark us into a bit of intensity. Energies seemed to have redoubled as if the players had suddenly understood just what was at stake. That said, it took ten minutes for us to fashion a chance but when it came, it was a peach that if taken, would have set up a riveting final few minutes.

Vasyl Bilyi received the ball in the right-back area from Eugene Lozovyi and spotting the run of Zubar in behind the Kolos back four, played a superbly judged long ball into the space for the striker to run onto. He galloped into the penalty area and as the goalkeeper advanced slipped it beyond him. Unfortunately, the ball rebounded off the base of the one piece of woodwork not to have been hit so far during the afternoon and although that rebound fell back to Zubar, the angle was against him and his speculative driven effort flew wildly off towards the far corner flag and eventually out for a throw-in.

That was as good as it got for us and after five minutes of stoppage time, the referee brought the action to a close. I puffed out my cheeks, stood up and made my way across to congratulate my opposite number, Ruslan Kostyshyn, on the three points. He already had his hand proffered and as I took it, his strong handshake emanated warmth.

‘Well played,’ he said in heavily accented English.

‘Thank you,’ I replied. ‘You thoroughly deserved to beat us. Good luck for the rest of the season.’

He smiled a wide grin, showing teeth that had been stained by tobacco, coffee or a combination thereof. ‘And to you too. See you in few months.’

I shook hands with my players as they left the field to go down the tunnel and then thanked the match officials before taking one last look at the scene of my managerial debut, trying to take it in for the memory bank before turning on my heel, plunging my hands into my coat pocket and heading out of the rain which hadn’t let up all afternoon down the tunnel turning over in my head the scale of the job ahead of me.

The contrast between the noises coming from each dressing room never failed to surprise me, it was rare that both came away from a game contented and on this occasion the jubilation breaking through the walls of the home room gave way to stony silence as I opened the door to ours. Players were slumped, some already topless, shirts thrown across the room in despair.

‘Get showered, boys, something to eat and then on the bus by 6.’ I said, turning to Drachenko who nodded to show that he understood. There was nothing to be gained by holding a huge post-mortem now, that could wait until training. I turned around, opened the door and let my mind begin to whirr all over again, replaying the game and searching for improvements, just as it would for the remainder of the evening, over and over again.

Kolos Kovalivka 2-0 Rukh Vynnyky

Team: Dyachenko, V.Bilyi, Chepelyuk, Duts, Pysko (Bidlovskyi), Vebrnyi, Tkachuk, Grysyo (Lozovyi), B.Baranets, Zubar, Kozlovskyi

Subs not used: Illyuscehenkov, G.Baranets, Markovych, I.Bilyi, Khomchenko

Link to post
Share on other sites

11 hours ago, mark wilson27 said:

Welcome to FMS  he_2.

A great start to the story. Well detailed and presented. Will be looking forward to seeing how your career progresses

 

11 hours ago, CFuller said:

Welcome back. I enjoyed the South Korean story you started last year, and I look forward to reading more of this.

Thanks, guys! I really appreciate that!

Unfortunately, the South Korean save ended up corrupting, so I couldn't build on that one. Hoping this one has more legs!

Link to post
Share on other sites

Saturday 8th July 2017 - Results and Table

Balkany Zorya

0-1

Gelios

Desna

1-0

Volyn

Glimyk-Sport

1-2

Cherkaskyi Dnipro

Ingulets Petrove

1-1

Zhemchuzhyna Odesa

Kolos Kovalivka

2-0

Rukh Vynnyky

Mykolaiv

0-2

Kremin

Naftovyk-Ukmafta

1-0

Avangard Kramatorsk

Obolon-Brewer

2-0

Poltava

Sumy

3-2

Arsenal-Kyiv

 

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Kolos Kovalivka

1

1

0

0

2

0

3

2

Kremin

1

1

0

0

2

0

3

2

Obolon-Brewer

1

1

0

0

2

0

3

2

Sumy

1

1

0

0

3

2

3

1

Cherkaskyi Dnipro

1

1

0

0

2

1

3

1

Desna

1

1

0

0

1

0

3

1

Gelios

1

1

0

0

1

0

3

1

Naftovyk-Ukmafta

1

1

0

0

1

0

3

1

Ingulets Petrove

1

0

1

0

1

1

1

0

Zhemchuzhyna Odesa

1

0

1

0

1

1

1

0

Arsenal-Kyiv

1

0

0

1

2

3

0

-1

Glimyk-Sport

1

0

0

1

1

2

0

-1

Avangard Kramatorsk

1

0

0

1

0

1

0

-1

Balkany Zorya

1

0

0

1

0

1

0

-1

Volyn

1

0

0

1

0

1

0

-1

Mykolaiv

1

0

0

1

0

2

0

-2

Poltava

1

0

0

1

0

2

0

-2

Rukh Vynnyky

1

0

0

1

0

2

0

-2

 

Link to post
Share on other sites

2.       Ukrainian First League: Rukh Vynnyky v Sumy (12th July 2017)

Having had a sleepless night on the Saturday, I spent Sunday mooching around Lviv and seeing what it had to offer. Over a pot of coffee and a decent English style fry-up in Cukor, which I’d found highly recommended on Trip Advisor, I resolved not to dwell on what had gone before but to focus on what lay ahead. I certainly didn’t feel there was any benefit in dredging up the Kolos game the following day during training and going over old ground, instead look at rectifying what I’d thought had gone awry and put some fixes in place for the midweek match with Sumy, who would provide my opening test at the Bohdan Markevych stadium.

To take my mind off football altogether I took myself off in search of a pick-me-up and ended up at Lontskogo Prison which also doubles as the Ukrainian National Museum and Memorial to victims of the Occupation. I’ve always had a fascination with history, particularly in the first half of the 20th Century and although bleak, this place was right up my street. The crimes that took place here at the hands of firstly the NKVD and then, after the Nazi occupation of the city at the end of June 1941 the SS, defy belief and I could never do justice to the memory of those that were victims, I simply couldn’t find the words. It was a haunting, dank, dismal place and, to be perfectly honest, enormously sobering. If a place like this doesn’t make you put your own life into perspective nothing ever will!

That evening I spent a couple of hours constructing a plan on how to try and move the club forward and professionalise it and present it to Grygoriy Kozlovskiy to see if there was a way in which we could implement things. It would cost a bit of money and, having seen the financials upon joining the club, I knew that the club was on track to lose the better half of £500,000 this season. Yet, to exist at this level we simply had to expand things a little, to speculate in order to accumulate.

As things stood, aside from my two-man coaching team, we had a single part-time physio who shared their duties with a local gym. The two-page proposal document saw three things looked at. Coaching, player identification & recruitment (which was currently non-existent) and the medical team. I asked for an increased budget for each one and set out the reasons why in bullet point format hopefully, to provide discussion points with Grygoriy. I sent him an email and attached the document, hoping that he’d be able to read it and then made a phone-call back home.

‘Hello?’

I paused a moment before replying.

‘Hello? Who is this?’

A deep breath in and then ‘Lottie? It’s me, Dad.’ I replied.

This time the pause came from the other end.

‘Lottie?’

‘What the hell do you want?’ I could feel the venom being spat down the phone.

‘To see how you are doing? To…’ I couldn’t finish the sentence because I knew full well what was going to come back at me

‘To what, apologise?’

‘Lottie, sweetheart…’

‘Don’t you DARE call me sweetheart! Don’t even think about it!’

‘It wasn’t my fault, there was nothing I could do!’ I protested.

‘Save it! Just… save it. I’ve heard it a hundred times before and you’re still as full of sh*t now as you always were. Just leave me alone! For the love of God, just leave me be, please!’ I could hear the tears coming through her words, tears of sorrow and tears of frustration – hatred even.

‘Just speak to your Uncle Max…’ The phone went dead in my ear and I threw it onto the bed. It bounced off and landed on the carpeted floor of the hotel room, without shattering. I thumped the arm of the chair in anger and desperation, I knew it had been a stupid idea to ring her, to try and reconcile again. But I had to keep trying, for her sake as much as mine. She needed me as much as I needed her, I just had to get her to realise that, to understand that her ire was being misdirected. Not this time though.

I poured myself a generous measure of rum, added a dash of ginger ale and downed it in one, the heat of the rum burning my throat and warming my insides within an instant before giving me that little headrush that I’d been searching for. The tidal wave of fuzzy alcohol to wipe away the gloom from inside my head.

***

I received a call after training on the Monday thanking me for my proposal. ‘I am happy that you have been thinking about the future of the club so soon.’ He said. ‘I would like to discuss further with you in person.’

‘Sure thing, how about after the game on Wednesday evening?’ I asked.

‘I will not be there, I am very sorry but I have business in Krakow on the Wednesday and Thursday. But I think we have no game on Saturday?’

‘That’s right,’ I confirmed. ‘I have the boys in for a double session instead, but I can be available whenever you are.’

‘Good, let us meet for lunch at 1:30pm then, I will send you the address. Marina will like have a guest around and meet you.’ Marina, I already knew, was Grygoriy’s wife and the mother of my centre forward Svyatoslav Kozlovskyi.

That was one familial link amongst a few at the club and one that Grygoriy had already assured me he would not interfere with should I deem in necessary not to select his son. That was a huge weight off my shoulders since, had I known at the time of interview of the link I would probably have given the opportunity a swerve. In addition, there were two sets of brothers at the club, neither twins. Vasyl and Ivan Bilyi, both of whom were defenders, and Grygoriy and Borys Baranets, the former who was a central midfielder with the ability to play down the right if required and the latter who had begun the season on the left flank.

Training was largely focused on working on improving the transition phase of our game as it had caused untold problems against Kolos and in the two sessions before the Wednesday evening match with Sumy, looking on I was able to finally reflect on some progress apparently being made. The shape of the first XI in the final 45 minutes of Tuesday’s session had far more structure to it and the link between the wide-men attacking the far-post when the ball was on the other flank began to land.

Sumy had won their opening game of the season, 3-2 against Arsenal-Kyiv and would be coming to the outskirts of Lviv in high spirits. Formed in 2001, they were comparatively old men in the annals of Ukrainian football, certainly by the standards of what I’d come across up until that point. This was their sixth season in the First League and had never finished higher than 8th. In 2016/7 they’d battled hard against the drop and finished 15th, staying up by way of winning their relegation play-off.

The side selected showed just the one change from the opener with Ivan Bilyi coming in to replace Oleg Chepelyuk at centre-half alongside Igor Duts.

Olexandr Dyachenko

Vasyl Bilyi           Ivan Bilyi             Igor Duts              Mykhaylo Pysko

Yuriy Tkachuk ©              Nazar Verbnyi

Maxym Grysyo                                                                                 Borys Baranets

Svyatoslav Zubar              Svyatoslav Kozlovskyi

Everything else was unchanged, I wanted to see what the impact of those extra couple of training sessions had been and although Oleg could feel slightly unfortunate in being left out, Ivan had showed up to be, I thought, a little more on the front foot when attacking the ball and so, got the nod.

The weather was at least dry, this time, and reasonably mild although not warm and quite blustery. As the two sides went through the usual rigmarole of shaking hands with each-other before the game, I turned to have a look in the main stand where the spectators were sat, the vast majority wearing jackets or hoodies to keep out the breeze, but there was a cluster of a couple of dozen men and women, all clad in red and white shirts and waving red and white scarves. There were three flags draped across half a dozen rows of seats, two of which were in Cyrillic lettering and so entirely incomprehensible to me, but one cross of St George and written in crude roman capital letters were the words WELCOME MR PAUL.

That was a nice touch, so I gave the group a little wave of recognition and thanks. The crowd looked around half of that in Kolos which had been just shy of 550 but, they made a decent noise considering the wind and the lack of cover.

The game began and within a minute we were within a whisker of going a goal behind. A Vasyl Bilyi throw-in on the right midway inside the Sumy half found Maxym Grysyo but his header back to Bilyi was intercepted by Olexandr Lebedenko. He played it forward quickly to Artem Gryschenko just inside halfway and he was happy to go back to Olexandr Lytvtnenko, his goalkeeper. After a little bit of pinball, the ball found its way to Mykola Vechurko and he spread it wide down the right for Igor Medynskyi who was in an acre or two of space. His ball inside found Gryschenko and the powerful striker was able to run at the heart of our back four. Unleashing a shot from just outside the D of the penalty area he wasn’t quite able to get the curl he desired and sent the ball narrowly wide of Dyachenko’s right hand upright.

Disaster struck in only the 3rd minute this time around and this particular calamity was entirely of our own making. I’d encouraged us to try and build from the back with Dyachenko distributing short, ideally to a full-back. On this occasion, he chose to pass it to Igor Duts, who was stood about 10 yards outside the penalty area from a goal-kick. All would have been fine at the on-loan Shakhtar man not shown the first touch of a randy panda. The ball slipped away from him and Gryschenko was onto it in a flash. He took it past the stumbling Duts and as Ivan Bilyi came across to close him down, Maxym Lisovyi surged into the vacant space and when the ball was popped across the 6-yard box all the midfielder had to do was to turn it into the net beyond Dyachenko.

A goal down inside 3 minutes. I tried to remain implacable on the bench but I could feel my blood pressure rise several octaves in despair.

Three minutes later after a couple of more encouraging passages of play from us that just lacked a final ball, Lebedenko was released behind Vasyl Bilyi by a lovely ball from Medynskyi and his left footed effort from the angle inside the penalty area flew beyond Dyachenko and probably took the topcoat of paint off the fascia of the far post on its way wide for a goal-kick.

Let-off gave way to let-off when in the 13th minute, some nice interchange in our half of the pitch saw Lisovyi send a sumptuous ball into the box, towards the far post where Medynskyi arrived to sweep the ball into the net beyond Dyachenko. 2-0! After less than quarter of an hour. Could things get any worse? Well, no! The cheer from the fans behind me alerted me to something happening on the pitch. I looked to my right and there he was, the angel, bedecked in black and holding aloft his fluorescent flag. Medynskyi had misjudged his run (or we’d got our offside trap working unusually well) and the goal had been chalked off!

We lived to fight on!

Just.

Lebedenko missed a golden opportunity when, the referee chose to ignore a clear push in the back of Mykhaylo Pysko by Gryschenko as he went up to head a long pass forward away and his low pass into the 6-yard box saw the Sumy man somehow turn his effort against the prone body of Dyachenko, who had valiantly spread himself at the attacker’s feet more in hope, I think, than expectation.

Finally, at the midway point of the half we created an effort ourselves, Borys Baranets’ high deep cross from the left after picking up a pass from Yuriy Tkachuk was headed against the outside of the post by Grysyo but it seemed as though normal service had been resumed less than 90 seconds later when Medynskyi picked up a short free-kick and thundered a strike from 22 yards which beat Dyachenko and walloped against the crossbar. Lisovyi smashed the rebound over the bar but he had been flagged offside anyway.

I wasn’t sure how much more of this I could take. Less than 2 hours into my managerial career and the overwhelming majority of it had been utter toilet. I wasn’t quite drafting my resignation letter in my head, but I was certainly questioning myself in a big way as I stood there, one arm folded across my tummy and my other hand pensively working my beard.

With five minutes of the half remaining the seemingly impossible occurred. Vasyl Bilyi sent a long free kick forwards and the Sumy back four, expecting an offside flag or hearing a call didn’t move. Substitute Victor Kromchenko (who had replaced the injured Svyatoslav Kozlovskyi after 13 minutes) got onto the ball inside the penalty area on the right-hand side. His cross to the far post was slightly behind Borys Baranets but the experienced campaigner showed presence of mind to nod the ball down into the path of the waiting Yuriy Tkachuk. The on-loan midfielder from Karpaty needed no second bidding to fire the ball low goalwards, beyond the dive of Lytvynenko and into the net for the most unlikely of equalisers.

Oh, how football has the ability to change one’s mood in a mere moment. From the pit of despair in which I’d found myself moments before, here I was leaping into the air, punching it wildly in joyous euphoria. This, if we held on at the break, changed everything I was going to impart to my charges.

Of course, expecting us to hold on was too much to hope for, wasn’t it? Oh yes, because when, two minutes after drawing level, Borys Baranets’ right wing corner hit Artem Gryschenko on the knee and then rebounded off Ivan Bilyi’s calf into the path of Igor Duts whose effort rebounded off Vechurko back into the path of Ivan Bilyi who then did the decent thing and put the ball into the net from about a yard out, they decided to go and take the bloody lead didn’t they?! Bloody hell, out of nowhere we suddenly held the advantage. I couldn’t believe it as I hugged Drachenko in absolute merriment.

By rights at the break we should have been long dead and buried, but somehow we found ourselves ahead. I watched the visiting side as they left the pitch and they looked completely shell-shocked.

In my few words, I tried to explain that the balance of power in the game had shifted in that last five minutes and that we, now, were in control. They were there for the taking, I firmly believed that. We’d get chances and if we took them, we were away.

Alas, within 6 minutes of the restart we were pegged back. A long ball forward was cut out by half-time sub Irakli Tsykoliya and the ball fell for Dmytro Koshelyuk. He found a little bit of space and then laid a ball forward into the path of Medynskyi. As Pysko tried to come across and cut off the danger, the Sumy forward took a low shot early right footed low, across Dyachenko and into the bottom corner, kissing the base of the post on it’s way in. A super finish, all about technique and precision had made it 2-2 and once again, it was very much game on!

I made a change just past the hour park bringing on the more creative Grygoriy Baranets for Nazar Verbnyi in the heart of the midfield because although we hadn’t gone to pieces as we seemed to do when conceding up until that point, we weren’t threatening to create much of any value either.

In the 68th minute a superb move that begun with Igor Duts feeding a pass forward to Tkachuk, then including Grygoriy Baranets, Svyatoslav Zubar and then Maxym Grysyo saw the latter’s low diagonal cross turned in at the far post by the elated Borys Baranets. This time I’d expected the flag and when it was waved to cut short our celebrations this time, I turned to Drachenko and smiled ruefully. Such a shame as it had been a wonderful move.

That though was the signal for us to begin to turn the screw and produce our best football of the season so far. Shots peppered Lytvynenko’s goal, mostly admittedly from distance and those that were on target required no more than routine saves, however I felt for the first time that we were truly the better side in an encounter.

Ten minutes later, Duts, whose contribution improved somewhat after his early misdemeanour, rose handsomely to head a clearance back with interest. Kromchenko picked up possession and laid it off neatly into the path of Zubar. He ran at his marker and sensing Grysyo steaming up outside him on the overlap waited until the opportune moment to lay the ball into his path. The right-winger was inside the penalty area and in space, no-one between him and the goal. There were four red shirts busting themselves to get into the penalty area in support and it was one of those who, when Grysyo had the presence of mind to send the ball across instead of go himself, turned the ball home. Substitute Grygoriy Baranets couldn’t really have missed and as he wheeled away in celebration, I was once again out of my technical area, fists pumped in celebration.

3-2 up and we were resembling a football team at last. Now though, I found myself in a bit of a dilemma. Did I shut up shop and try and sit on our advantage or try and attack and get a fourth goal. I’d made my third and final change 8 minutes earlier replacing Pysko with Volodymyr Bidlovskyi at left-back. There were 13 minutes plus stoppage time remaining. I couldn’t umm and ahh for too long, I had to be decisive.

I chose to stick.

And that decision very nearly paid dividends. Zubar was denied by a fine Lytvynenko save when put through by Kromchenko with ten minutes remaining and then, from the corner, Grygoriy Baranets picked up a headed clearance 30 yards out, found his brother with a smart ball and from the angle, 10 yards out, his low shot beat Lytvynenko but rebounded off the base of the near upright before being cleared by a grateful defender.

Sumy were spent and we were able to see the final ten minutes out in relative and surprising comfort. As the referee, Mykola Balakin finally blew for time after two minutes of stoppage time I raised my arms to the air in triumph. After half an hour I would have literally eaten anyone who would have had the temerity to suggest that we would end up victorious, but we did and it was those lads in all red, who were taking the acclaim of the 300 or so home supporters that deserved all the credit.

I acknowledged our fans as well after shaking hands and commiserating with Pavlo Kikot, my opposite number, before disappearing down the tunnel and into the home dressing room where water bottles were flying and players were dancing around, jumping up and down in celebration of a job well done.

Calling for quiet, trying to calm them took a moment but when they did settle, I clenched my fists, pumped them and shouted “YESSSSSSS!!!!!” That provoked the lads back to action and, after shaking each one by the hand I left them to it, exiting the dressing room feeling emotions of elation mixed with relief. Elation that we’d proven that we belonged at this level and relief that I no longer felt like a phoney or a fraud. I had delivered. WE had delivered.

Rukh Vynnyky 3-2 Sumy

Team: Dyachenko, V.Bilyi, I.Bilyi, Duts, Pysko (Bidlovskyi), Vebrnyi (G.Baranets), Tkachuk, Grysyo, B.Baranets, Zubar, Kozlovskyi (Khomchenko)

Subs not used: Illyuscehenkov, Markovych, Chepelyuk, Lozovyi

Shots: 19 – 14

Shots On Target: 9 – 3

Possession: 58% - 42%

Link to post
Share on other sites

Wednesday 12th July 2017 – Results and Table

Arsenal-Kyiv

1-1

Mykolaiv

 

Avangard Kramatorsk

1-1

Kolos Kovalivka

 

Cherkaskyi Dnipro

0-1

Obolon-Brewer

 

Gelios

2-0

Girnyk-Sport

 

Kremin

1-4

Balkany Zorya

 

Poltava

3-3

Desna

 

Rukh Vynnyky

3-2

Sumy

 

Volyn

2-0

Ingulets Petrove

 

Zhemchuzhyna Odesa

1-0

Naftovyk-Ukmafta

 

 

 

 

 

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Gelios

2

2

0

0

3

0

6

3

Obolon-Brewer

2

2

0

0

3

0

6

3

Kolos Kovalivka

2

1

1

0

3

1

4

2

Desna

2

1

1

0

4

3

4

1

Zhemchuzhyna Odesa

2

1

1

0

2

1

4

1

Balkany Zorya

2

1

0

1

4

2

3

2

Volyn

2

1

0

1

2

1

3

1

Sumy

2

1

0

1

5

5

3

0

Cherkaskyi Dnipro

2

1

0

1

2

2

3

0

Naftovyk-Ukmafta

2

1

0

1

1

1

3

0

Kremin

2

1

0

1

3

4

3

-1

Rukh Vynnyky

2

1

0

1

3

4

3

-1

Arsenal-Kyiv

2

0

1

1

3

4

1

-1

Avangard Kramatorsk

2

0

1

1

1

2

1

-1

Poltava

2

0

1

1

3

5

1

-2

Ingulets Petrove

2

0

1

1

1

3

1

-2

Mykolaiv

2

0

1

1

1

3

1

-2

Girnyk-Sport

2

0

0

2

1

4

0

-3

Link to post
Share on other sites

Saturday 15th July 2017

Basking in the glow of a series of firsts was difficult not to do. Rukh’s first goals and win at professional level, my first goals and win as a fledgling manager. Mentally, I’d been preparing myself to try and justify myself as a manager through three winless months before being ejected unceremoniously, never to manage again. If nothing else, this win would enable me to argue with justification that I was able to win games, whether that would be a regular argument remained to be seen. I gave the players the Thursday off since they’d flogged themselves silly on the pitch in pursuit of the three points after that lousy first half-hour, and with no game until the following Wednesday, when we were due to host winless Arsenal-Kyiv at the Bohdan Markevich, that gave us plenty of opportunity to work on the training pitch.

I went into the club to pick-up my boots, which I’d forgotten to pack in my kit bag the previous evening and bumped into Svyastoslav Kozlovskyi who was having treatment on his ankle injury which had forced him off so early the previous day, and Borys Baranets who was undergoing a rubdown on a long-standing back niggle. I said a quick hello and tried to ask how they both were – again with a series of halting phrases in pigeon English, pheasant Ukrainian and extravagant mimicry – and they told me, I think, that they were both hopeful of being fit for the Arsenal-Kyiv game. The weekend, I suspected, might have been too tight for them, but with six days to get themselves back fully fit, I should still have a fully fit squad from which to choose.

This language barrier was, I have to admit, proving a bit more of a problem than I’d envisaged. Perhaps I’d stupidly thought that ‘football being a universal language’ was actually a thing and whilst I had managed to get my messages across more often than not, I really needed to learn Ukrainian for day-to-day use as much as in my work life. I’d gone to get a haircut and beard trim before the Sumy game and had to embarrassingly show the barberette a selfie to show how I wanted it cut where I’d much rather have been able to say ‘number one on the back and sides, faded and a little off the top and please just give the beard a tidy-up.’ It was, probably, my most acute moment of narcissism, ever. To be fair, she had done an excellent job, but I hated having my hair cut in awkward silence. On this occasion, there was no choice.

I’d immediately found a language tutor upon beginning the job and was undergoing as intense a tuition as I felt I could cope with. An hour face-to-face every day (including weekends), countless books to read, tapes to listen to and always having talk radio or the news channel on whilst I was in the hotel room. Along with the tuition, I was trying to learn as much as I could by osmosis as well. It was confusing, I often felt mentally overloaded if not with football, then with language and sometimes a combination of the two. I had heard from a number of overseas team-mates that they often found the first ten weeks or so the most difficult in England, even if coming with some background in knowing the language. Almost universally, those that had immersed themselves as fully as possible into learning English through wide exposure tended to settle in quickest and blossom. Those that cut themselves off tended more to struggle and, oftentimes would have gone back to the continent within a year of landing on British shores.

In the meantime, I’d kept adding to and tweaking the proposal that I was going to discuss with Grygoriy and, by the time I arrived on his doorstep having been collected and deposited door-to-door by his chauffeur, it was twice as thick as it had been when I sent across the opening draft, but being the conscientious eco-friendly progressive lefty that I am, I made sure I printed the hard copy on double sided A4 to prevent too much paper wastage. Go on, call me Swampy!

Grygoriy opened the door of the grand 5-bedroomed country pad in Tsarskoe Selo and warmly welcomed me. I handed over the bottle of wine that I’d brought along with me, not really knowing if that was the done thing in Ukraine, but as it was graciously accepted in the manner in which it had been intended, I felt reassured of not having committed a grotesque social faux-pas. ‘Come come, you must meet Marina,’ he said and led me through the living room and into the kitchen where a tall, naturally blonde woman in her mid-late 40s was busily stirring a rich smelling sauce on the centre-isle electric hob.

‘Marina, please, meet our guest, Paul Tilletson.’ Grygoriy said to his wife. She looked up, and as I’d expected she was an elegant looking woman yet naturally so.

‘Delighted to meet you, Mr Tilletson,’ she almost drawled in an accent that was heavily and unmistakeably American. I took her hand and just about stopped myself from bending down and kissing it like a knave addressing a princess.

‘And you, Mrs Kozlovskyi. Thank you so much for inviting me to your beautiful house.’ I gazed around and taking in the expensive but not at all gaudy décor. Grygoriy was clearly a man of taste, from the sharply and well-tailored suits that fitted his athletically built frame perfectly, through his perfectly-maintained hair and into home furnishings and beyond.

‘Oh, please, call me Marina.’ She said almost coyly.

‘Then you must call me Paul.’ I replied.

‘You have a deal, young man.’ Her eyes shimmered as she smiled and it really wasn’t hard for me to see why Grygoriy had fallen for this woman. ‘I hope you like chicken and a white wine jus?’

‘It sounds – and smells – wonderful.’

Grygoriy had popped open the bottle of Chablis that I’d provided and poured three glasses. ‘Well, Paul, I think lunch will be soon ready. Shall we toast to Rukh and this season?’ He raised his glass.

‘To Rukh and this season,’ I agreed, clinking his glass with mine gently and then the same with Marina’s.

Lunch tasted as good as it had smelt, and looked, and I learned that Marina had been born in Sevastopol where she had lived before moving to Los Angeles in 1992 to work as an actress. Some side appearances in a few Hollywood films ‘usually as the trophy wife of an Eastern European villain’ she bemoaned gave way to a return to Ukraine, and Lviv, six years later having met Grygoriy a few months earlier whilst he had been in LA on business. The two of them had fallen head over heels, she had fallen pregnant with Svyastoslav and the rest was history.

We were more than halfway through a second bottle of Chablis by the time the meal was over, and after Marina had provided Grygoriy and I coffee, she excused herself. ‘I must go and sort out Vladi,’ she said. ‘Paul, it’s a pleasure to meet you, you must visit again, for dinner next time!’

I accepted her kind offer and said that I would arrange something with Grygoriy before thanking her for the food. Absurdly, I found myself bowing and realised less than halfway through, but long after the point of being able to abort the idiotic gesture, what a colossal goose I must have looked. Blushing, I swiftly sat back down on the sofa in the living room and she left with a look of wry amusement on her face.

‘Vladi is her horse. She loves him, I think, more than me. Every day it is Vladi this and then Vladi that. She spends hours at the stable, cleaning out and brushing him. She does not pay me perhaps half that attention.’ Grygoriy said by way of explanation, guffawing loudly. ‘So, Paul, we get down to business,’ he said planting himself into a deep red armchair situated to my right. ‘You have made some changes, yes?’

I nodded. ‘That’s right. Just some additions, things I’ve thought of, and one or two little changes as well to the original draft I sent across to you.’ I handed him over a plastic wallet containing the two double-sided typewritten sheets which he removed, sat back in the chair and read over. I took the chance to have a glance around the room and take in the view out of the French windows that led out onto a raised terrace, and then below, a long and beautifully manicured lawn that was a rich green. With the cloudless sky, it was a picture-perfect summer’s day.

After a couple of minutes with nothing more than the ticking of the silver carriage clock that was stood on the mantelpiece above the fire and the occasional chirrup of some birds filtering in through the open windows from outside Grygoriy spoke, setting the papers on the coffee table and removing his half-moon glasses, something I genuinely hadn’t seen anyone wear for years, if not decades. ‘So, Paul, all is very thorough but it will cost money, yes?’

I nodded. ‘Of course.’

‘The club, it has no money.’ Grygoriy responded. ‘You have seen figures, you know we owe money to bank. How can we pay for this?’

Swallowing, I took up the challenge. ‘Grygoriy, do you want the club to progress?’

‘Of course,’ the president replied looking slightly taken aback.

‘Then it has to become more professional. There needs to be a structure in place for it to grow, it’s the only way to ensure that the club keeps progressing and moving forward. Right now, I have an assistant manager and a goalkeeping coach to help with training and then we just have the part-time physio to look after the players. Sumy came to us on Wednesday night with five coaching staff and three medics – a doctors, a physio and a sports scientist. We turned up at Kolos last weekend with just four of us in total and looked amateur by comparison.’

Grygoriy pursed his lips. ‘Are you saying we do this to look professional? That is no benefit.’

‘No no,’ I countered. ‘Absolutely not. We do this to be professional. The document talks about the need for four new members of coaching staff; a fitness coach, a couple of first team coaches and a head of youth development. Having the first three alone will revolutionise training sessions, I’ll be able to devise sessions that are far more varied and specialised than what I’m able to provide now. The players will be more motivated, become better footballers and fitter too. Also,’ I continued, flipping the document to page three where I’d made some points about the medical side of things. ‘Having a full-time physio available at all training sessions is an absolute must, if one of the players feels a tweak or a twinge, I can pull him straight out and get him looked at and assessed. Then, on matchdays we should have a fully qualified doctor available in case of serious injuries – I mean head injuries and the like, to assess for concussion and other things like that. He doesn’t need to be full time, just around on matchdays.’

‘And the sports scientist?’ Grygoriy prompted, barely able to keep the sceptical tone absent from his voice.

‘A nice to have, admittedly,’ I confessed, ‘but the benefits are absolutely clear. Plans for nutrition, post-match recovery, how to limit stress injuries – all things that with the intense training plans I want to put in place to get the best out of this group will keep them fit and available for longer. You can’t stop players picking up injuries, but you can do things to mitigate them happening more regularly than they should.’

‘Mitigate? What is it?’

‘Sorry, stop them from happening more regularly than they should.’

‘Sounds like hogwash. The players will not like it.’

‘I’m not asking them to like it, they won’t have an option. But, I guarantee you, within three months they’ll all feel the benefit. Trust me. I was sceptical when this was all brought in at Tottenham when I was a youngster, but without some of the things sports science provided, I’ve have been finished as a top-flight player by the age of 30.’

Grygoriy’s eyebrows raised quizzically. ‘By 30, really?’

‘Unquestionably. I learned how to look after myself, it was a godsend.’

There was a murmur from the other chair. ‘Recruitment – tell me more.’

I puffed out my cheeks. ‘Well, part one is the head of youth development – he is part of the training staff - but part of his remit is to attract younger players to the club, begin to offer youngsters a pathway through the club into the first team. If we have players that are good enough, I’ll select them regardless of age. A strong youth system will only benefit the club in later years. You won’t see an immediate return, but if well managed, within 2-3 years you’ll see players coming through and then there’s the potential to have local lads in the side, which fans love, or if they’re good enough, the financial windfall from selling them on.’

‘Mmmhmm. And scots? What are they?’

‘Scouts?’ I corrected, gently. ‘If we have three or four people out on the road watching games, watching youth teams of other clubs or checking out players without a club, you can begin to identify targets and prioritise them. Find some bargains to strengthen the side, some who could play for next to nothing because they simply want to be playing football. Trust me, not every player is driven by money, many are driven by wanting to play at the highest level possible and if offered the chance will show plenty of hunger.’

I went on to ask for a space somewhere, ideally at the ground, that I could use as a base. An office. Working in my hotel suite was fine, but I wanted to have somewhere at the club where I could hold discussions or just work whilst training was happening if I needed to. It could be a converted cupboard for all I cared, or a portacabin in the car-park, just something would be perfect. I didn’t want to end up getting cabin fever in the hotel room, that wouldn’t be at all healthy. One or two more self-explanatory and smaller items, water to be available pre and post-match in the dressing rooms, that kind of thing, were mooted and then, after about forty minutes I’d come to an end of my list of demands.

There was a momentary silence whilst Grygoriy digested my words, my rationale for this way forward. ‘I will think. For two or three days I will think hard and I will talk to some people and then we will talk again. Before the next match.’

I thanked him for at least taking the time to listen and consider what I’d proposed, even if nothing came of it at least I’d tried. I knew that Grygoriy had the best interests of the club at heart and that any decision wouldn’t be taken lightly either way. The financial strain the club was under meant that on a regular basis he was having to pay in a sizeable six-figure sum (in sterling, never mind hryvnia) to keep the threat of the banks foreclosing on the club at bay. I’d work with whatever he agreed to (or otherwise) and do the best I could.

Shaking me warmly by the hand, he called up his chauffeur to take me back to my hotel. and we agreed to meet again a couple of hours before the Arsenal-Kyiv game was due to kick-off.

Link to post
Share on other sites

3.       Ukrainian First League: Rukh Vynnyky v Arsenal-Kyiv (19th July 2017)

 

One of the fascinating things about English football is the notion that there’s too much football at the top level. It’s a nonsense, of course, since most Premier League clubs end up playing, on average, less than once a week across the course of a season once you factor in their inevitable early exits in both cup competitions which, rather than being treated seriously, are nothing more than old-style reserve team fixtures and whilst those clubs that are more successful can end up playing 50-60 matches in a season if they make progress in Europe, such is the depth of squads these days that to be honest, being a top-flight footballer has never been easier. I say this with the benefit of experience and from the ‘inside’, believe me, there’s nothing more frustrating than playing maybe just five matches in the entirety of January and February after an embarrassing FA Cup exit at the hands of Wrexham or Northampton Town has left you with plenty of time to twiddle your thumbs whilst your colleagues are out playing. I’ve been there and loathed it.

Believe it or not, my favourite ever season as a player was in 2003/4 when, as a 22-year old battling my way back to full fitness after an achilles tear, I went on-loan to Millwall from Portsmouth for a year to regain match-fitness and get some games under my belt. The Lions, fresh from a 46-game league season under Dennis Wise’s stewardship, also reached the FA Cup Final after a run from the 3rd round that saw us avoid being drawn against any top-flight sides until the final, when Manchester United tanked us 3-0. I was suspended for that final after being dismissed a fortnight before, rightly, for a pretty awful challenge in a game at Oakwell, but I played 54 matches that season including many midweek games – sure, there were times when niggles held me back a little, but the thrill of playing Saturday-Tuesday-Saturday can’t be beaten.

Coming off the back of the win against Sumy, I’d really wanted to crack on at the weekend, but the League, in their infinite wisdom, had chosen to leave us with a blank Saturday, meaning that we reconvened on the Wednesday evening back at the Bohdan Markevych for the visit of Arsenal-Kyiv.

The Ukrainian version of the Gunners had lost their opener against Sumy, 3-2, and then drawn at home the week before against Mykolaiv. Although nothing can be read into results at this early stage, certainly going three matches without a win can begin to build a little anxiety amongst players, management and supporters alike – owner’s fingertips have been known to hover over triggers ready to pull, so our visitors on what was a glorious, balmy midweek evening would be absolutely desperate to get themselves off the mark.

Unlike the Johnny Come-Latelys I’d encountered up to this point in my Ukrainian adventure, Arsenal actually had a rich (and confused) history to boast of. At least by comparison.

Many lazy Brits would, I imagine, expect that the club had been named in honour of the North London behemoth, and whilst the two clubs’ foundations bear comparison, there is no link whatsoever between them.

The roots of the current club were formed in 1925 as part of a multi-sports club of the Arsenal factory in Kyiv, which had been founded in 1764 as a repair and production facility for the Russian Army, the football club’s early years were spent competing in local amateur competitions until 1936, when they first appeared in the Soviet Cup, exiting in a 1st round replay.  In the late 1950s the club (under the name FC Mashynobudivnyk Kyiv) competed in the 2nd division of the Soviet league until 1964 at which point they either changed their name to FC Temp Kyiv, lost a relegation play-off or simply allowed the existing FC Temp Kyiv, which represented the Aviant aviation factory in Kyiv, to take their place, depending on which account you believe.

Records of the club disappear from 1964 until the re-establishment post-break-up of the USSR and the formation of FC Boryspil by renowned geologist and businessman Dymtro Zloblenko in March 1993. What follows is a web of name changes, mergers and confusion which would make any professional money launderer blush with pride. I’ll try and give you the potted history, though, since it’s so different to anything found in England, with the possible exception of the many clubs which went into the formation of Dagenham & Redbridge in the early 1990s.

Strap yourselves in, here we go!

Shortly after formation, FC Boryspil (1) merged with FC Nyva Myronivka who were competing in a semi-professional Ukrainian league and the new entity were named Nyra-Borysfen (2).

At the beginning of the 1993/4 season FC Borysfen Boryspil (3) played in the Ukranian 2nd League and during the winter break at the beginning of 1994 changed its name to FC Boryspil (4), going on to gain promotion at the end of the season.

Prior to the 1994/5 season, another merger took place, this time with CSK ZSU Kyiv and became FC CSKA-Borysfen Boryspil (5) before relocating to Kyiv at the beginning of 1995 and undergoing yet another identity change, becoming FC CSKA-Borysfen Kyiv (6). At the end of the 1994/5 season the club were promoted once again, this time into the Ukrainian top-flight and they began life alongside their city rivals, Dynamo with such latter luminaries as Sergey Federov and Andriy Husin amongst their number. Indeed, the squad that gained promotion to the top flight included amongst their number, Oleg Kuznetsov – these names being familiar to students of the Eastern European game in the 1990s.

The club remained in the top flight for 18 years under the guise of FC CSKA-Kyiv (7) until 2001, the latest name change taking place due to a boardroom struggle between Zloblenko and the Army which the entrepreneur lost and resultedin the formation of another new club who split away from CSKA.

In 2001, following severe financial difficulties, CSKA were bailed out in part by the mayor of Kyiv, Oleksandr Omelchenko, who decreed that there should be a formation of a new limited company within which 51% of the shares should be owned by the local community with the remaining 49% being owned by the Ministry of Defense and CSKA through a limited company. This partnership saw the birth of FC Arsenal Kyiv (8).

Arsenal was intended to be the ‘club of the city’ and was funded by the local council with an annual budget of around £8million and played at the national Olyimpyskiy Stadium until a dispute saw them exiled and forced to play back in Boryspil or at the Lobanovsky Stadium owned by Dynamo. That latter agreement soon ended due to political differences between Omelchenko and the Surki brothers who owned Dynamo.

After Omelchenko had left his position as Mayor of Kyiv, his successor Leonid Chernovetskyi opted to initially cut the funding and then auction off the club to the highest bidder. Vadim Rabynovich took ownership and began to finance the club until in 2009, 3-years after taking control, Chernovetskyi purchased the club for 1 Hyrvnia and installed his son as president before Rabynovich re-purchased the club less than a year later following mismanagement by Stepan Chernovetskyi.

A tangled web, I’m sure you’ll agree, but not unusual for post-Soviet footballing administration. And, there’s more to come.

In November 2013 the club was declared bankrupt and withdrawn from all Ukrainian competitions. A dispute between Rabynovich and Oleksandr Onyshchenko, who had initially declared his willingness to clear Arsenal’s debts and fund the team led to Rabynovich’s resignation as club president and Onyshchenko withdrawing his promise of money. Arsenal failed to fulfil a league fixture against Dnepr Dnipropetrovsk and then a cup fixture before it appeared that in an act of solidarity, the other 15 top-flight clubs had come together to provide the funds to allow Arsenal to finish the season. However, when it came to replaying the cancelled league fixture, Dnepr refused to play and the FFU (Ukrainian Football Federation) decided to disqualify Arsenal from competition.

The club was reformed ahead of the 2014/5 season by a group of former players, supporters, local businesses and the profile of rally driver Olexsiy Kikireshko, under the name FC Arsenal-Kyiv (9) competing initially in local competitions for a year before a single season in the Ukrainian Second League and gaining promotion to the First League in summer 2016, finishing 10th first time out.

Strangely, at first glance, for a club whose history is so interlinked with the military not to mention one in Eastern Europe where supporters of many clubs are notoriously right-wing (in some cases downright fascist), Arsenal’s fans have built a reputation as left-leaning and anti-fascist. However, the Arsenal Factory had a heavily pro-Bolshevik sentiment during the January uprising of 1918 and the club’s colours of blue and red are the same as those of the flag of the ‘other’ USSR, the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic.

I was already chomping at the bit to get the boys back out there and felt further buoyed by the brief conversation with Grygoriy Kozlosvkyi I had as the boys were warming up. Having been delayed by an overrunning meeting, he was waiting for me at the back of the stand and didn’t beat around the bush as he informed be that he’d acceded to the vast majority of the proposed changes to the structure of the club. There were one or two caveats, such as trialling a Sports Scientist for six months, but I could live with those.

‘I have thought long, and I have spoken to other people I know in football, I think there will be benefit so will make changes to the club budget but, you must be aware that benefits must be ones I see quickly.’ He warned. ‘I cannot gamble future of club on fantasy.’

‘Thank you, I promise you that if you don’t feel you’re getting value for money and feel you have to cut back, I will not complain.’ I vowed.

‘Ho-kay,’ came the reply. ‘If you need help with adverts then speak with Marina, she can help as she works in recruitment.’

‘Will do, thanks Grygoriy.’ I stood, and we shook hands.

‘Paul,’ he called as I began to descend the stairs of the stand. Stopping, I turned around. ‘Win today, yes?’

‘I’ll do my best, Mr President!’ I smiled and went on my way to finish my pre-match preparations.

There were a couple of changes to the side with the finally fully fit Andriy Markovych coming in at right-back for Vasyl Bilyi and Victor Khomchenko replacing Svyatoslav Kozlovskyi up front. Otherwise, it was very much ‘as you were’.

Olexandr Dyachenko

 

Andriy Markovich            Ivan Bilyi             Igor Duts              Mykhaylo Pysko

 

Yuriy Tkachuk ©              Nazar Verbnyi

 

Maxym Grysyo                                                                                 Borys Baranets

 

Svyatoslav Zubar              Victor Khomchenko

 

The crowd looked much the same size as it had the week before and aside from a booking for either side for mistimed challenges, Maxym Grysyo for us, the scattered ranks of supporters had to endure 20-odd minutes of absolute tedium before either side fashioned anything worthy of the description ‘opening’.

Slick build-up play down the Arsenal left saw the ball worked in-field to their playmaker Maxym Borovets and he, in a little space, threaded a pass forward to their Argentine centre-forward, Diego Aguirre. He took the ball in his stride, running at the heart of our defence before letting go with an early snap-shot from the edge of the D, but it drifted harmlessly wide of Dyachenko’s left-hand post.

The half quickly settled back down into tedium with both sides misplacing passes and very much cancelling each-other out until 2 minutes into added time at the end of the first period, a throw-in deep in the Arsenal half on the left-hand side saw Mykhaylo Pysko throw it back to Khomchenko, who had dropped deep to find some space. The striker’s ball into the penalty area saw Nazar Verbnyi collect and set himself with his first touch before curling a shot from about 15-yards narrowly past the far angle of post and bar. It was very nearly spectacular, instead it ended up just missing an ambulance that was parked behind the goal.

At the break, I tried to preach a bit of patience to the boys, patience and a little more confidence and bravery when in possession to make things happen. We’d had most of the ball in the first period but done next to nothing with it. I wasn’t going to burn their toast if they tried something in the attacking third to make something happen, whereas just playing it safe all the time was likely to send me into orbit with frustration.

The opening stages of the second period were absolutely no better than what had gone before, except for a snap shot on the angle from Artem Stargorodskyi which beat Dyachenko and rattled the base of the far post before falling to Pysko to clear. On the hour mark Olexandr Vechtomov’s long free-kick saw Markovych get wrong side of Aguirre, thankfully with no blue shirt within 15-yards of him the South American was forced to try and go it alone, eventually hitting the side netting.

This was the other slightly testing part was that the visitors were clearly set-up to contain and try and snatch something. They’d arrived in a very solid and structured 4-5-1 with Aguirre often finding himself isolated. I asked Drachenko if he could look to get the full-backs playing 10-15 yards further forward, just to help the midfielders manage the deficit in the middle of the park and try and get us on the front-foot a little more, pin Arsenal back more than they were comfortable with so far.

I brought on Grygoriy Baranets in an attempt to provide a little more invention, the steady Verbnyi making way, but the best of the opportunities continued to fall Arsenal’s way, in particular to Aguirre. Another ball over the top completely split Igor Duts and Ivan Bilyi sending the Argentine clear on goal. Again, his finishing wasn’t up to the task and he failed to work Dyachenko, sending the ball well wide of the right-hand upright. For all of our possession, Arsenal were looking likely to pick something up with a ‘classic’ away performance.

Within 60 seconds of that Aguirre chance, the deadlock was finally broken. A goal-kick from Sergiy Sitalo saw Aguirre out-muscled by Markovych. Ivan Bilyi picked up the loose ball and sent a raking long ball forward. Khomchenko had anticipated this and was already on the move in behind the two visiting defenders and found himself with the freedom of an entire postal district. His first effort was excellently saved by Sitalo, but the rebound fell to Khomchenko who first time rifled the loose ball high into the roof of the net from 12 yards out. 1-0 up and with our first clear opening of the game, we’d gone ahead.

This time, I kept any histrionics to a minimum, choosing just to clap and give Victor the thumbs up. The truth was that I felt we’d kind of stolen that goal out of nowhere and I was fully expecting to feel the full wrath of the Arsenal machine in response.

Actually, the goal began to give us confidence, just as it had the week before against Sumy. Yuriy Tkachuk began to take a stranglehold of the midfield and began to link-up nicely with Grygoriy Baranets. A couple of minutes after the goal, the two fashioned an opening for Svyatoslav Zubar, a sumptuous little ball over the top and Zubar, with time to pick his spot, picked out the legs of the sprawling Sitalo and the ball was blocked behind for a corner.

On 76 minutes, Eugene Lozovyi’s left-wing corner was whipped in towards the penalty spot. Khomchenko was looking to get onto the ball when he appeared to be baulked by a defender. Indeed, the official had no hesitation in pointing to the spot and brandishing a yellow card to the offender, Jemal Kizilatesh who, video replays would later show, had clearly man-handled Khomchenko’s shirt.

Myhaylo Pysko stepped up from 12-yards (I’ve always quite liked the idea of left-backs taking penalties) and coolly sent Sitalo the wrong way to extend our lead and give us a bit of a cushion. I don’t mind admitting to clenching my fists as the keeper moved to his left, away from where Pysko sent the ball, we had 13 minutes plus stoppage time to see out and hopefully, pick-up our second win of the campaign.

There was no onslaught, the wind had been taken out of Arsenal’s sails with that seven-minute spell in the second half. We hadn’t been by any means great, but we had done what mattered and taken our chances when they came. This felt like quite a bit test had been overcome, and whilst not with flying colours, I was more than happy to take the rainbow as it came.

Rukh Vynnyky 2-0 Arsenal-Kyiv

 

Team: Dyachenko, Markovych, I.Bilyi, Duts, Pysko, Vebrnyi (G.Baranets), Tkachuk, Grysyo (Lozovyi), B.Baranets, Zubar, Khomchenko

Subs not used: Illyuscehenkov, Bidlovskyi, V.Bilyi, Chepelyuk, Kozlovskyi

Shots: 16 - 10

Shots On Target: 6 – 2

Possession: 57% - 43%

Link to post
Share on other sites

Wednesday 19th July 2017 – Results and Table

Balkany Zorya

0-0

Mykolaiv

Desna

2-0

Cherkaskyi Dnipro

Girnyk-Sport

4-1

Kremin

Ingulets Petrove

0-1

Poltava

Kolos Kovalivka

0-0

Zhemchuzhyna Odesa

Naftovyk Ukmafta

0-0

Volyn

Obolon-Brewer

0-0

Gelios

Rukh Vynnyky

2-0

Arsenal-Kyiv

Sumy

0-3

Avangard Kramatorsk

 

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Desna

3

2

1

0

6

3

7

3

Gelios

3

2

1

0

3

0

7

3

Obolon-Brewer

3

2

1

0

3

0

7

3

Rukh Vynnyky

3

2

0

1

5

4

6

1

Kolos Kovalivka

3

1

2

0

3

1

5

2

Zhemchuzhyna Odesa

3

1

2

0

2

1

5

1

Avangard Kramatorsk

3

1

1

1

4

2

4

2

Balkany Zorya

3

1

1

1

4

2

4

2

Volyn

3

1

1

1

2

1

4

1

Naftovyk-Ukmafta

3

1

1

1

1

1

4

0

Poltava

3

1

1

1

4

5

4

-1

Girnyk-Sport

3

1

0

2

5

5

3

0

Cherkaskyi Dnipro

3

1

0

2

2

4

3

-2

Sumy

3

1

0

2

5

8

3

-3

Kremin

3

1

0

2

4

8

3

-4

Mykolaiv

3

0

2

1

1

3

2

-2

Arsenal-Kyiv

3

0

1

2

3

6

1

-3

Ingulets Petrove

3

0

1

2

1

4

1

-3

 

Link to post
Share on other sites

4.       Ukrainian First League: Avangard Kramatorsk v Rukh Vynnyky (22nd July 2017)

We were in a good place. I was in a good place. Two wins on the bounce had gone a long way to convincing myself that this managerial lark was something that I could be at the very least, competent at. Training was good, players were turning up with smiles on their faces and full of jocularity whilst not taking the piddle and showing full focus during the drills as we prepared for the weekend game with Avangard of Kramatorsk.

They were coming off their first win of the season, having thumped Sumy 3-0 on the road with a performance that was every bit as emphatic as the score-line suggested. A stern test awaited us on the road, of that I was absolutely certain.

Although in a good place and feeling a lot more certain than I had been a fortnight previously of my place in the dugout and Lviv, my nerves were about to be severely tested by our impending away-day.

Kramatorsk is a city located in Donetsk oblast, about 2-hours north of the city of Donetsk and was the scene in April 2014 of an intense battle between Ukrainian forces and pro-Russian separatists. Separatist forces, looking to form the Donetsk People’s Republic, took control of the city on 12th April and held-off a number of counter-attacks from government forces over the next three months before, under increasing pressure, the DPR forces withdrew and retreated to Donetsk city allowing the city to come under government control again on the July 5th. More than 50 people had been killed in the fighting and when the government forces took control of the city, government figures said that there were 22 others still in hospital.

With Donetsk having been proclaimed the capital city of the DPR and under control of the separatists, Kramatorsk found itself the administrative capital of Ukrainian held Donetsk oblast. Although an uneasy peace seemed to be holding, I knew enough to know that an uneasy peace is a lot less secure than, well, an easy one and although Kramatorsk was firmly pro-Kyiv rather than pro-Moscow, the war and uncertainty in the region had been something I’d had to think long and hard about before accepting the role at Vynnyky.

Fortunately, I had a couple of friends from school who had gone onto work in the UK Foreign Office, both of whom had taken a keen interest in post-Soviet politics and history. They’d gone a long way to reassuring me that being situated in Lviv I’d be well insulated from the worst of the unrest and that even if I did need to go anywhere near the DPR or neighbouring Luhansk People’s Republic, that protection from Ukrainian security forces would be extremely high.

‘There’s nothing to worry about,’ Rossco had told me on the phone. ‘Honestly, mate, you were more in danger living as close to Southampton as you did when you were at Pompey!’

‘Where was your Foreign Office advice then?’ I queried.

‘Ah, that comes under Home Office jurisdiction, Tilly. You’d have to ask Holmesy about that.’

Nothing beats a bit of bureaucratic Sir Humphrey smoke and mirrors!

Talking to Grygoriy had helped as well.

‘Paul, we will be fine. I know people in Kramatorsk, good people. There is occasionally some trouble, but that is no different to anywhere else. Put your mind at rest.’

I couldn’t quite manage that, but on the 1200km coach trip from west to east, I was able to relax, rest and focus on some podcasts and audiobooks which, then brought with it sleep and I arrived in Kramatorsk feeling more sanguine than I’d imagined I was going to.

The scars of the battle, still only three years past were still visible in parts of the city as drove through, some half-destroyed barricades had been left either to ruin or as a memorial, it was hard to tell which, and it brought home to me how lucky I’d been never to have even had to visit somewhere deemed even partially unsafe during my playing career. Sure, we’d been to some godforsaken places where you lacked a little for creature comforts, particularly early on in my career and the early noughties when on visits to Albania, for example, but never somewhere that felt anything less than inherently safe.

The Prapor Stadium, which stood in the Bernatskiy Gardens, had been built in 1936 and although, as was the case seemingly everywhere, the 6000 seats were in the open-air, there were seats around all four sides. Down one side behind the seats was a beautiful double-archway that was befitting its 1930s origins and brought to mind, in some strange way, the Olympic Stadium in Berlin and the open-end behind one of the goals.

Avangard had been in the First League since 2012 although never really threatening to gain promotion in that time. Re-formed in 1955 they spent much of the period until 1970 in the Soviet National Championship before and then, the early post-independence years in the local Donetsk oblast competitions. In 2010, after an 11-year period of idleness, they were granted their professional licence and were able to compete in the Second League in 2011-2, gaining promotion as champions at the first attempt.

Aside from the 2014/5 season, when due to the unrest in Donetsk they were unable to compete, the club have largely been hovering around upper-mid table and achieved a 7th placed finish in 2016/7. Again, upon arrival, there was a sense that off the pitch the club were a little further forward than we were.

The welcome from the hosts was unfailingly warm as we traipsed off the bus two-hours before kick-off. I asked Drachenko to take the boys off around the gardens for half-an-hour to stretch their legs and relax whilst I made the final decisions on the team in the peace and quiet of the dressing room.

Whilst we were in a confident place, it hadn’t escaped my notice that we’d only played well in fits and starts so far without really impressing across a full 90 minutes. I was fairly certain that would come in time, equally I knew that we’d ridden our luck a little in the two home games and that there was a real need to be tighter defensively as well as better and more incisive in possession. With that in mind, I felt that on balance, in spite of being away from home we would be better served with the more forward-thinking talents of Grygoriy Baranets in the middle of the park alongside Yuriy Tkachuk rather than the steadier Nazar Verbnyi. Aside from that, I chose to go with the same side as that which had begun against Arsenal. So, on the white-board I etched the starting XI and began to lay out the kit.

Olexandr Dyachenko

Andriy Markovich            Ivan Bilyi             Igor Duts              Mykhaylo Pysko

Yuriy Tkachuk ©              Grygoriy Baranets

Maxym Grysyo                                                                                 Borys Baranets

Svyatoslav Zubar              Victor Khomchenko

Through my increasingly fluent attempts at mime, street dance and halting Ukrainian, I told the lads that I wanted the back-four, in particular, to stay a bit more compact and in touch with each-other throughout the game whilst emphasising, as best I could, the need to be more incisive going the other way.

‘You, Grygoriy,’ I pointed at Baranets the younger, ‘Pass forward. Always forward.’ I drew arrows on the whiteboard showing what I wanted, feeding the wingers or into the one of the two strikers. I felt that he was the key for us, just with is extra vision and range of passing.

The usual back-slapping, clapping and handshakes provided the remainder of the encouragement for the boys and, just over an hour later as I sent them back out after one of the most blindingly soporific 45-minutes of football I’d ever been treated to as a player or spectator, it was the same, only with a little more urgency and assertiveness behind my encouragement.

The opening 10-minutes or so of the second period were little better, and then, a long clearance from the Avangard keeper was met inside the centre circle by the head of Igor Duts. Mykyta Polyulyakh pulled the bull down and fed it neatly forward into the path of Anton Yevdokymov, who had entered the fray seconds before, and his first contribution was to chip the ball down the right for Olexandr Ivaschenko to run onto. He’d managed to get beyond Mykhaylo Pysko and sent a lovely cross into the heart of the 6-yard box where Eugene Shyvdyki got the run on both Duts and Ivan Bilyi to plant his header firmly beyond Dyachenko, who had precious little chance of keeping the ball out of the net.

The cross was superb, the movement by Shyvdyki quite out of keeping with the game to that point yet the defending was, in the words of Ricky Ponting, pretty ordinary. One of the two centre-halves should have taken responsibility and at least put a challenge in on the striker instead of allowing him an unchallenged header at goal.

I was frustrated. I thought that at least with them being no-more effective than we were that we’d be good for a dull point, but one moment of quality had us behind. I knew from experience how difficult it was to raise the tempo when you’re stuck in a rut and after five further minutes of drudgery, I made a double change with Verbnyi replacing Yuriy Tkachuk and the ineffective Svyatoslav Zubar being replaced by his namesake of the Kozlovskyi variety up-front.

On 73 minutes, Marat Daudov went perilously close to making it 2-0 when, from about a yard and a half outside our penalty area, plum centre, he fired a left footed free-kick no more than a foot wide of the post with Dyachenko unsighted and rooted to the spot. A minute later, the goalkeeper was to thank for preserving our single goal deficit when Ivaschenko was played in down the side of Pysko and Duts and his low shot was superbly pushed behind at full-stretch by the goalkeeper.

I’ll give my boys some credit, I can’t fault the endeavour and the effort, but the quality was sorely lacking. Avangard were able to hold out for the most comfortable of single goal triumphs and, in doing so, leapfrogged us in the table.

With a 1200km journey home ahead of us, I didn’t feel it was the right time to hold a post-mortem immediately after the game. Indeed, with another midweek game ahead and providing us with a home game to try and set things right, I felt it was right to look forward and not backwards with the boys, and mull over what had gone wrong here on my own and in my own time.

There had been three Vynnyky fans who had made the trip out to Kramatorsk to see us and I felt it was only right to honour their efforts by offering them a seat back home on the team coach. Their eyes widened at the offer but they said that they had overnight accommodation booked and flights the following afternoon. Humbled at their support, I shook their hands and told them to get in touch with the club if they were going to any other away games and if we could, we’d be happy to transport them with the team.

It was a long, largely quiet and very disappointed journey westwards with everyone in largely reflective mood. I was quite pleased to see that the defeat was hurting the boys as much as it had me. As we left the Bernatskiy Gardens, I opened by A4-pad, closed my eyes and began to replay the game in my mind.

Avangard Kramatorsk 1-0 Rukh Vynnyky

Team: Dyachenko, Markovych, I.Bilyi, Duts, Pysko, G.Baranets, Tkachuk (Verbnyi), Grysyo, B.Baranets, Zubar (Kozlovskyi), Khomchenko

Subs not used: Illyuscehenkov, Bidlovskyi, V.Bilyi, Chepelyuk, Lozovyi

Shots: 6 - 3

Shots On Target: 3 - 1

Possession: 50% - 50%

Link to post
Share on other sites

Saturday 22nd July 2017 – Results and Table

     

Arsenal-Kyiv

2-2

Balkany-Zorya

Avangard Kramatorsk

1-0

Rukh Vynnyky

Cherkaskyi Dnipro

0-1

Ingulets Petrove

Gelios

0-1

Desna

Kremin

1-2

Obolon-Brewer

Mykolaiv

1-1

Girnyk-Sport

Poltava

2-2

Naftovyk-Ukmafta

Volyn

2-1

Kolos Kovalivka

Zhemchuzhyna Odesa

1-1

Sumy

 

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Desna

4

3

1

0

7

3

10

4

Obolon-Brewer

4

3

1

0

5

1

10

4

Avangard Kramatorsk

4

2

1

1

5

2

7

3

Volyn

4

2

1

1

4

2

7

2

Gelios

4

2

1

1

3

1

7

2

Zhemchuzhyna Odesa

4

1

3

0

3

2

6

1

Rukh Vynnyky

4

2

0

2

5

5

6

0

Balkany Zorya

4

1

2

1

6

4

5

2

Kolos Kovalivka

4

1

2

1

4

3

5

1

Naftovyk-Ukmafta

4

1

2

1

3

3

5

0

Poltava

4

1

2

1

6

7

5

-1

Girnyk-Sport

4

1

1

2

6

6

4

0

Ingulets Petrove

4

1

1

2

2

4

4

-2

Sumy

4

1

1

2

6

9

4

-3

Mykolaiv

4

0

3

1

2

4

3

-2

Cherkaskyi Dnipro

4

1

0

3

2

5

3

-3

Kremin

4

1

0

3

5

10

3

-5

Arsenal-Kyiv

4

0

2

2

5

8

2

-3

Link to post
Share on other sites

5.       Ukrainian First League: Rukh Vynnyky v Zhemchuzhyna Odesa (26th July 2017)

 

Another Wednesday evening, another home league game and we were to welcome one of three still unbeaten sides to the Bohdan Markevych. Zhemchuzhyna, from Odesa on the Black Sea coast, had picked up a win and three draws from their opening four matches meaning that they were a place above us in 6th by virtue of a better goal-difference.

Upon arrival at the Markevych, I was greeted by the sight of a small portacabin in the car-park. Wandering over, I noticed a little name-plate on the outside of the door in roman typeface: Mr P.Tilletson – Head Coach. Trying the door, it opened and there, in front of me was a bookcase down one wall, a filing cabinet in the far corner and a simple, but good-sized pine-effect desk upon which was a white desk-lamp. In front of the desk were a couple of simple white garden chairs whilst on the other side was a rather more comfortable looking black leather office chair in which was sat Grygoriy Kozlovskyi.

‘Ah, Paul.’ The president said. ‘Welcome to your kingdom.’ He opened his great wingspan and motioned around the room. ‘What do you think?’

‘It’s perfect,’ I said, looking around and nodding my approval. ‘Thank you! This is just what I need!’ And it was. Basic, but dry and perfectly adequate for my requirements.

‘You ask, and Grygoriy tries his best.’ The president stated, the note of pride unmistakeable in his voice. It was as if he had built the thing with his own bare hands. ‘You have power, yes? And that door there,’ he pointed to a door in the far-left corner, ‘that takes you to an area with a kettle and coffee is there. When you need toilet, you use the stadium.’ He placed a set of keys on the desk. ‘Here is key to office and key to stadium and here,’ he reached into a desk draw producing a manila folder and waving it in the air, ‘is application forms for your helpers so far from Marina. Please, take a look and ring her tomorrow, yes?’

Taking the folder, I had a glance inside and saw a number of CVs and application forms divided by role and then stapled together – everything had been translated into English. I hadn’t given any thought to the language barrier when recruiting until this point, Marina – or someone who reported into her – had gone above and beyond.

‘Please pass my thanks on, for these,’ I said. ‘I’ll have a read through this evening and get in touch with her in the morning.’

‘Of course, of course,’ Grygoriy said removing himself from the chair and heaving his frame around the desk. ‘I leave you in peace and quiet before the game now. Please, take your seat and good luck for this evening!’ He glanced towards the stadium behind the cabin. We shook hands and I took my place in the chair. ‘There is nothing else for now, no?’ he asked as he opened the door to exit.

‘Actually,’ I said quickly, something just springing to mind. ‘Yes.’

Grygoriy closed the door and looked at me with a raised eyebrow.

‘Well,’ I began before taking a deep breath and plunging on with something that had come to mind on the long road voyage back from Kramatorsk at the weekend. ‘We have started the season pretty well, better than I expected if I’m honest. But,’ I paused again looking at Grygoriy whose expression had remained quizzical. ‘Well, our forwards. I’m not sure they’re good enough.’ In fact, I’d wanted to describe them as “wilfully sh*t” but remembered who I was speaking to. ‘So far, they’ve scored once between them and I can barely remember another chance falling to any of them. Besides, we only have three. Zubar, Khomchenko and your boy. If we suffer injuries or suspensions, we’re a bit knackered.’

‘And what you want?’ Grygoriy asked. He was going to make me work a bit harder for a new striker than he had for this room in which we found ourselves.

‘I know we don’t have any space in the wage budget, but if I can find a new striker that I think will improve us, is there any chance at all that we might be able to have a look at the figures to bring him in?’ Grygoriy said nothing and I almost winced as the seconds ticked by, half-expecting an eruption from the tall figure in front of me. I felt I’d already pushed my luck with getting the backroom staff approved and wasn’t sure how much rope I had left to use.

‘You have player ready?’

‘No, not yet.’ I confessed. I thought it might be a bit too obtuse even for me to suddenly whip out a list of prepared targets at this point.

Another pause and then Grygoriy opened the door again.

‘When you have player ready, we talk.’ And with that gruff reply, he was away.

I breathed a sigh of relief and leant back in the chair. It was very comfortable, I could definitely see myself making myself at home here for the next few months…results – and cheek - permitting, of course!

***

At just before 6:30pm, having glanced over the CVs and applications and begun to make some notes it was time to walk across the car park and into the ground to lay the groundwork for the match. As I locked the door to the cabin, I was approached by a figure that must have been about 6’8” tall and potentially almost the same width.

‘Mr Tilletson.’ The heavily accented pronunciation of my name coupled with the colossally deep timbre I don’t mind admitting, but the mild fear of all that is holy into me.

‘Umm, yes?’ I tried not to stammer too nervously. The imposing figure was blocking a quick getaway in pretty much every direction and was casting a very noticeable shadow over my comparatively squat frame.

‘I am Vasyl Makarov.’ The man stated matter of factly. ‘I am chair of Rukh supporter group.’

I looked up for the first time and saw a man whose skull looked as though it was made of a steel casing and with a neck apparently made of concrete, or perhaps cordite. Looking down, I noticed he was flexing the fingers of his right hand which, when clenched, was probably not much smaller than the size of my own cranium. If, as I half suspected, he was going to drive that hand into my chin, there’s not doubt that my head would have flown off the top of my neck like the foil top from a milk bottle and end up rolling about 250 yards across the car park.

‘I hear you offer Rukh fans lift back from Kramatorsk at weekend.’

I swallowed down my fear a little, thinking that there was no conceivable way that this could have been a bad thing. ‘Yes, that’s right.’

Vasyl nodded slowly, as if weighing up which way he should hammer me into the ground. He put his fingers together and I heard the crack of his knuckles reverberate around the car-park like rifle fire. Or at least what I imagined rifle fire to sound like in an empty car-park, I’d never heard any gunfire in person, least of all in a car-park – open-air or multi-storey.

‘That was a good thing. I thank you.’ He offered me one of his enormous hands to shake which I gladly accepted, trying ever so heard not to audibly gush my relief. ‘So far you do good job here at Rukh,’ he went on. ‘On Friday before home Saturday game supporter group meet at local bar. You very welcome to come before Gelios game in few weeks. Please.’

Flipping heck, I hadn’t been expecting that 30 seconds before!

‘Of course,’ I said. ‘I’d be delighted to. Where is the bar?’ Vasyl offered me a card with the address written down in both Cyrillic and roman script.

‘We meet at 7 for few hours, drink beer or vodka and talk football. I hope see you there.’

The least I could do was to take him up on his offer. Not only as I suspected it might be a good way to keep my face the same shape as it was, but also because it felt genuinely kind and heartfelt. Any club is only as good as its fans, whether there are 3million of them worldwide, or 300 of them in a small town like there was in Vynnyky. I was beginning to get the sense of a bit of community around the club which I liked, and which was missing at some clubs infinitely bigger that I’d spent time at.

‘I’ll aim to be there by 9 at the latest, although I may only be able to stay for an hour or so.’ I said. ‘We have the game the following day and I’ll need to make sure we’re fully ready.’

Vasyl broke into a wide and quite charming smile. ‘Yes. Yes. Mr Tilletson. You very welcome.’ We shook hands again. ‘God with you tonight.’ He said, pointing at the stadium before letting go of my hand and walking away.

Able to finally breathe that sigh of relief that I’d been keeping in for the previous few minutes, I marvelled at the kindness of the bear-like man before turning and making my way into the ground.

***

I went with a single change, in spite of the disappointment at the weekend, and tried out the hitherto untried strike duo of Svyatoslav Kozlovskyi and Victor Khomchenko, Zubar dropping down to the substitute’s bench.

Olexandr Dyachenko

 

Andriy Markovich            Ivan Bilyi             Igor Duts              Mykhaylo Pysko

 

Yuriy Tkachuk ©              Grygoriy Baranets

 

Maxym Grysyo                                                                                 Borys Baranets

 

Svyatoslav Kozlovskyi    Victor Khomchenko

 

30 seconds into the action, a superbly judged tackle by Igor Duts denied Taras Lazarovych in the penalty area just as the Odesa striker was about to pull the trigger after a Eugene Shyryaev clearance had found its way from one end of the pitch to the other, but after that, we soon settled into the game.

A minute later, Kozlovskyi was found by a Grygoriy Baranets ball forward and his cross from the right was headed goalwards by Khomchenko, however his effort lacked power and Shyryaev was able to make a good save to his right. Already, we’d created more than we had at the weekend.

In the 11th minute a Yuriy Tkachuk free kick on the left-hand edge of the penalty area was headed clear by an Odesa defender and fell nicely for Grygoriy Baranets. The midfielder hit an effort towards goal from 25-yards which deflected off a blue shirt and into the path of Ivan Bilyi who swept the ball into the net from inside the 6-yard box. As he wheeled away in celebration, the referee’s whistle brought to an end his delight – his assistant had raised his flag and ruled the defender offside.

Ten minutes later, an Odesa move broke down and the loose ball fell nicely for Mykhaylo Pysko deep inside his own half. Looking up, he pinged a quite beautiful ball into the path of the onrushing Svyatoslav Kozlovskyi and as he entered the penalty area, he had Khomchenko steaming up in support on his left, totally unmarked. Choosing to go it alone, Kozlovskyi fired wastefully over the top when a pass to his team-mate would have left him with a simple finish into a gaping net.

We were made to pay five minutes later when a free-kick on the left edge of our penalty area was delivered into the near post by Ivan Grebenyuk and Lazarovych again outjumped the red shirted defenders to guide a beautiful header just inside the near post beyond Dyachenko’s despairing dive. Once again, the lack of a challenge on a high ball into our box had left me pounding my palm with my fist in frustration.

The clock had ticked into the 34th minute of the game when Duts won a challenge just inside the Odesa half and fed the ball to Tkachuk. He found Grygoriy Baranets with a simple pass and it was then swept out to the right flank for Maxym Grysyo. A neat one-two with Kozlovskyi left him clear of the Odesa full-back and he drove a low ball across the face of the 6-yard box. Shyryaev went down and got a good hand to the ball which took it away from the onrushing Khomchenko, but sadly for the goalkeeper, into the path of Borys Baranets. The left winger gleefully guided the ball into the waiting red and white striped netting and wheeled away in unadulterated glee. We were level, and the goal had shown two elements that I’d been banging on about in training. The need to get the wingers one-on-one against the full-back and the need for the wingers to attack the far post when the ball was wide on the opposite flank. 1-1 and game on!

A minute later, a patient and neat build-up from one end to the other down the right saw Khomchenko tuck a ball into Kozlovskyi whose low shot was excellently repelled low down by Shyryaev at his post and then with two minutes of the first half remaining, the goalkeeper made another superb save, this time from Khomchenko whose header at the far post from another Grysyo cross again, lacked power.

At the break, I could barely contain my delight. But I did, since we were level although the performance had been by far and away our best to date. The only note of disappointment was our inability to take chances. Sure, some would say that at least we were creating plenty and whilst that was true enough, if we didn’t take them, we were bound to be punished. Still, I tried to emphasise the positives and implored the boys to keep going.

A warning sign was announced four minutes after the break when Lazarovych dropped deep to pick up a ball from Grebenyuk before turning and feeding Anatoliy Didenko who was making a run from deep into a gap left by Bilyi trying to track the run of Lazarovych. Didenko fired a low strike at goal but the advancing Dyachenko got down low, spreading himself and made a very good smothering stop to maintain parity.

Six minutes later, and Shyryaev again came to the rescue for the visitors after Borys Baranets fed Kozlovskyi inside the penalty area and whilst the shot was headed in, the Odesa goalkeeper had flung himself to his left to get a firm hand on the ball, pushing it behind for a corner kick. A third outstanding intervention from the visitor’s custodian. I was beginning to get a little annoyed by him!

On the hour mark, as I looked for that crucial second goal, I made a double change, bringing on Nazar Verbnyi and Svyatoslav Zubar on for Tkachuk and Khomchenko. Within five minutes the former got onto a knock-back by the latter inside the penalty area and sent a placed volley – for once – beyond the grasp of Shyryaev but, agonisingly, just too high and off the top of the crossbar and over the top for a goal-kick.

I was on the edge of the technical area, partially delighted with what I was seeing since the football was excellent, but also highly frustrated by the catalogue of chances that were going begging. I urged them forwards, clapping my encouragement and feeling the supporters getting behind the boys as well.

Three minutes later, Grysyo fed the ball into Kozlovskyi who, instead of shooting across goal tried to beat Shyryaev at the near-post, allowing the goalkeeper this time, to make a fairly routine block and then, in the 73rd minute, a ball from Pysko sent Zubar clear but his shot was equally straightforward for Shyryaev to push behind for a corner.

We had to believe, I had to believe that one of these chances was going to be taken.

Pysko, once again picked the ball up on the left flank, fifteen yards inside his own half and spotting the run of Zubar, pinged a second delightfully judged over the top for the substitute to run onto. Zubar was clear, entered the penalty area and then, opening his body as if to stroke the ball inside the far post, gave Shyryaev ‘the eyes’ and instead, with a sweep of his right foot, planted the ball inside the near post instead leaving the Odesa hero in the grey kit, wrong-footed.

The supporters, except one, I noticed, were in raptures and although delighted and relieved in equal measure, I was shouting at the lads to get switched on straight away and concentrate. I wouldn’t abide a lapse in concentration that would throw away this hard-fought advantage.

For a quarter of an hour, we did that well. Killed the game, took the sting out of it and I brought on Oleg Chepelyuk for Grygoriy Baranets to sit in front of the back-four, but then, as the game entered the final minute of the 90, substitute Ruslan Palamar slipped a lovely ball inside Pysko for Grebenyuk to run onto. He didn’t quite catch his angled shot as he would have wished, scuffing it slightly, but if anything, that made it even more difficult for Dyachenko but the alert goalkeeper, made no mistake in firmly pushing it wide for a corner kick.

That was as close as the visitors came to restoring equality and in the final minute of added time, Zubar was denied once again by the outstanding Shyryaev from the edge of the box as he plunged himself to his left at full-stretch, clinging onto the ball. Kozlovskyi then, twenty seconds later, fired wastefully over when 12-yards out, after Grysyo’s ball had once again split the Odesa back-four.

The whistle went shortly afterwards and brought to an end a game which we should have won a lot more comfortably and had very nearly come away with only a point. I made a point of having a word with the Odesa goalkeeper as I waited at the mouth of the tunnel to congratulate my boys and made sure that he understood that I thought he had been quite brilliant. His rueful smile told its own story. Pride in his own performance, despair at the result.

Before disappearing down the tunnel, I had a look up into the stand. Firstly, Vasyl Makarov who was bouncing around with a dozen others celebrating the three points and then, Grygoriy Kozlovskyi who was stood applauding with Marina at his side. I gave him a smile and a thumbs up before going to join in the celebrations just breaking out in the home dressing room.

Three wins out of five, a 100% record at home and this was, finishing aside, a performance that was a lot closer to what I had been hoping to impart over the previous month. Positive signs, all round.

Rukh Vynnyky 2-1 Zhemchuzhyna Odesa

Team: Dyachenko, Markovych, I.Bilyi, Duts, Pysko, G.Baranets (Chepelyuk), Tkachuk (Verbnyi), Grysyo, B.Baranets, Kozlovskyi, Khomchenko (Zubar)

Subs not used: Illyuscehenkov, Bidlovskyi, V.Bilyi, Lozovyi

Shots: 22 - 12

Shots On Target: 15 - 5

Possession: 54% - 46%

Link to post
Share on other sites

Wednesday 26th July 2017 – Results and Table

Avangard Kramatorsk

1-2

Arsenal-Kyiv

Desna

3-2

Kremin

Girnyk-Sport

0-1

Balkany Zorya

Ingulets Petrove

0-1

Gelios

Kolos Kovalivka

3-1

Poltava

Naftovyk-Ukmafta

1-0

Cherkaskyi Dnipro

Obolon-Brewer

1-0

Mykolaiv

Rukh Vynnyky

2-1

Zhemchuzhyna Odesa

Sumy

0-3

Volyn

 

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Desna

5

4

1

0

10

5

13

5

Obolon-Brewer

5

4

1

0

6

1

13

5

Volyn

5

3

1

1

7

2

10

5

Gelios

5

3

1

1

4

1

10

3

Rukh Vynnyky

5

3

0

2

7

6

9

1

Balkany Zorya

5

2

2

1

7

4

8

3

Kolos Kovalivka

5

2

2

1

7

4

8

3

Naftovyk-Ukmafta

5

2

2

1

4

3

8

1

Avangard Kramatorsk

5

2

1

2

6

4

7

2

Zhemchuzhyna Odesa

5

1

3

1

4

4

6

0

Arsenal-Kyiv

5

1

2

2

7

9

5

-2

Poltava

5

1

2

2

7

10

5

-3

Girnyk-Sport

5

1

1

3

6

7

4

-1

Ingulets Petrove

5

1

1

3

2

5

4

-3

Sumy

5

1

1

3

6

12

4

-6

Mykolaiv

5

0

3

2

2

5

3

-3

Cherkaskyi Dnipro

5

1

0

4

2

6

3

-4

Kremin

5

1

0

4

7

13

3

-6

Link to post
Share on other sites

6.       Ukrainian First League: Volyn v Rukh Vynnyky (29th July 2017)

Well, mercy me! Another Saturday afternoon and another road-trip – this time, mercifully, only 150km or so North-East to the city of Volyn, a journey of just over two hours.

Much had happened in the time since our success over Odesa. The lads were given the Thursday off whilst I got the interviews arranged via Marina. Some of them took place on the Friday, the remainder were arranged for Monday. By the time we’d boarded the trusty old coach for the voyage to Volyn, I had appointed the following positions:

Fitness Coach – Eugene Barzaka (27): This was Eugene’s first job in senior football, however he had extensive experience working on conditioning athletes at the University of Lviv, both throughout his time there as a student and since qualifying too.

Head Physio – Vasyl Filvarkorvyi (59): Vasyl brought with him vast amounts of experience having been, until the summer, a physio at Highest League club, Dnipro. Knowledge and experience wasn’t all he brought with him, for with him came a number two…

Physio – Andriy Fedota (27): As part of Vasyl’s leaving Dnipro, he’d set up his own private physiotherapy business and Andriy was his first recruit. The youngster had wanted to break into sports therapy in particular. On the agreement that we’d pay him a nominal hourly rate when he was working on our behalf, I was more than happy to provide Andriy with his first break in the game.

Then came the two members of the recruitment team that provided me with some extra food for thought:

Chief Scout – Leonid Tyurya (37): Leonid was a familiar face around the north-west of Ukraine watching games at all levels on a freelance basis as and when clubs required someone to either check a player out, or future opponents. The flexibility had suited him but now, with his wife being made redundant, he was looking for something with more security. I was bowled over by his knowledge of the game and, in particular players to the point that he’d already begun to pay dividends by putting me in touch with a centre-forward who had recently been released by Bukovyna following their relegation from the First League in the summer. Leonid’s feeling was that the player in question, who had spent time in the junior ranks at both Dynamo Kyiv and Shakhtar Donetsk, would be willing to play for relative peanuts in return for the chance to play regular football.

‘His motivation is very high,’ Leonid explained through the translator, Yulya. ‘He has some technical flaws, but he’s only 19, knows where the goal is and I firmly believe he can be a big asset to you. He’s better than two of those horse’s asses you have playing for you now up front!’

Clearly, not a man to mince his words, I offered him the job on the spot. Rarely has an interview or contract negotiation been so seamless.

The other appointment was one that I hadn’t really envisaged making:

Data Analyst – Danylo Monotenko (26): I hadn’t budgeted for, or really given any thought to getting in a data analyst, although I well knew the increasing value of having someone able to analyse and present data in the digital era. It was something that I felt might be a luxury for a club so short of money and seen as frivolous. However, when I saw an application for a role that hadn’t been advertised from someone that described themselves as ‘Rukh Vynnyky fan first, IT geekoid second’ (he’d actually used that exact terminology in English!) I got him in for a chat. He’d gone to the trouble of analysing our first five games and produced a 15-slide Powerpoint presentation, in English, that he spent an hour taking me through. It was a brilliant piece of work, outlining our strengths and weaknesses, backing up some of my hunches with statistics, disproving others – it was a real eye opener. I was convinced as to the value he would provide and after a quick phone call with Grygoriy, he was hired. Immediately, a couple of regular meetings were put in the diary – one on a Monday morning to review the weekend’s performance and look ahead to any midweek opponents and then one on a Thursday morning for the same thing – albeit reviewing a midweek performance and previewing the weekend’s opponents. Aside from that, he was to work closely with Leonid in providing some statistical value to the chief-scout’s words on potential signings.

With those positions filled, I had remaining vacancies for First Team Coach, Sports Scientist and Scout to appoint, however these would have to wait until after the visit to Volyn.

On paper, this looked like our biggest test to date. Volyn, after losing their opening game by the only goal to early pacesetters Desna, were unbeaten in their next four matches and, having just been relegated from the Highest League in the summer, looked to be putting everything in place for as quick a return as possible. Since we had completely failed to perform on the road in our opening two away games, all signs pointed to a probable home win.

I had a mini temptation to adjust the way we set ourselves up and look to contain a little more, before counter-attacking. However, after a bit of chewing the idea over in my head, I decided that no, I wanted to try and play as much as we could on the front foot. It may be a fool’s errand, but it’s how I wanted my teams to play. Balancing between idealism and practicality, or pragmatism is something I’ve long struggled with, this was no different. So, we lined up with just the single change to the side – Svyatoslav Zubar replacing his namesake, albeit of the Kozlovskyi flavour after the former’s goalscoring appearance from the bench in midweek.

Olexandr Dyachenko

Andriy Markovych           Ivan Bilyi             Igor Duts              Mykhaylo Pysko

Yuriy Tkachuk ©              Grygoriy Baranets

Maxym Grysyo                                                                                 Borys Baranets

Svyatoslav Zubar              Victor Khomchenko

This was by some distance the biggest crowd we’d played in front of – the noise from the almost 4,000 was deafening by comparison to the fractured hum of playing at home, even without any covering on any of the stands. With the temperature in the early 20s and a mild breeze blowing across the pitch, for the first time I elected to stand in shirt sleeves and, having been careful to apply some factor-35 to my pale and freckled skin, basked in the sunshine.

The opening stages were quite even, albeit with the hosts employing a shoot-on-sight policy that threatened the fans congregated behind Olexandr Dyachenko’s goal more than the actual target itself and we looked comfortable. That was until the 13th minute when a long ball forward into the penalty area caused Andriy Markovych no end of problems. He got stuck underneath the up and under and allowed Oleg Gerasymyuk to nip in, send a ball to the far post where Vadym Strashkevych arrived at pace to place a header that glanced off the face of the crossbar before flipping over and behind for a goal-kick. Skipper Yuri Tkachuk gave Markovych a few choice words which elicited an acknowledgement and wave of apology. It was quite encouraging seeing players beginning to take responsibility to sort things out for themselves on the pitch without me needing to bark unintelligible nonsense at them from the side-lines.

7 minutes before the break, with the pattern of play mostly matching the opening ten minutes, the hosts fashioned another decent opportunity with Strashkevych getting a ball into the penalty area where it was met by the arriving Dmytro Skoblov first time, from about 15 yards out. His connection was true enough, his aim was slightly awry, however, and the ball flew a foot, maybe a foot and a half wide of Dyachenko’s right hand post with the goalkeeper at full stretch and grasping only thin air.

A couple of minutes later, and we’d escaped from a woefully loose passage of play unharmed, somehow, when Tkachuk’s pass back for Ivan Bilyi was rather overhit meaning that the centre-back couldn’t gather the ball into his possession. Skoblov was sniffing around and nipped in, skipped over the desperate attempt by Bilyi to either win the ball or bring him down and then curled an effort from the edge of the box around Dyachenko’s dive and, thankfully, shaving the outside of his left-hand post on the way behind.

We went in at the break goal-less and although we had put in our best 45-minutes on the road to date, I was still very aware that we’d been fortunate not to fall behind. Asking for a little more incisiveness in attack in the second half – again through the medium of dance, mime and Ukraniglish. Having imparted my piece, I left it to Olexandr Drachenko to talk the boys through what we wanted in the second half in a bit more detail whilst I reapplied my sunscreen.

There’s nothing more pleasing than having what you say having an immediate impact. Whether it was my madcap communication or Olexandr’s more native and natural version, we’ll never know (it was clearly the former, though, obviously!) but 34 seconds into the second-half, Tkachuk won a challenge a couple of yards inside our own half and played a measured ball into Grygoriy Baranets’ path. Baranets found Grysyo with a neat pass and the winger ran 25 yards infield before letting Tkachuk take over once more. A dinked ball forward saw Victor Khomchenko cleverly roll his man and get to the by-line before somehow, splitting the two men facing him up and threading the ball through the eye of a needle across the 6-yard box for Grygoriy Baranets to strike low first time left-footed inside the near post beyond the Volyn goalkeeper, Vitaliy Nedilko, who had no chance.

After going ahead, we begin to take a little more control of proceedings whilst the hosts grew more and more frustrated. Shots were coming in from further and further out and although there were more of them, they were finishing ever further away from the target.

With 20 minutes remaining, Mykhaylo Pysko knocked a free-kick forward for Svyatoslav Zubar to take down, turn and unleash a super strike from 22-yards which beat Nedilko all ends up, but thumped back off his right-hand upright before being hacked clear by Valeriy Boldenkov.

The longer that went on, the more I thought we were going to see things home without too much hassle. Of course, those thoughts were rather dangerous. There were less than three minutes of the 90 remaining when Markovych found himself outmuscled down the Volyn left by his fellow right-back, Andriy Lyashenko – inexplicably finding himself in a left-wing position – and has he hared into the penalty area the angle looked inviting for a shot across Dyachenko and into the net.  Providence was smiling upon us, clearly, by placing a full-back in such alien territory and as he pulled the trigger, the ball skewed off the outside of his left-foot and wide of the near post, Dyachenko as relieved an onlooker as those of us on the bench and Markovych even more so than that.

Things became a little easier in the 2nd minute of stoppage time when the hosts’ Roman Nykytyuk (try saying that after a Ukranian liquid supper!) was dismissed for a second caution, bringing down Zubar with a clip of his heels after the striker threatened to break clear. After that, it was a simple case of running down the clock by any means necessary – admittedly not always legally as Khomchenko’s late caution showed – but we were able to do so comfortably enough to thoroughly enjoy the moment when the official brought proceedings to an end.

The second half performance had largely been one of maturity and with that in mind, I felt, had been our best 45-minutes of the season up to that point. We’d taken the chance that fell our way and then managed the game pretty well to pick up our first away points of the season. Not only that, but we’d beaten one of the fancied sides on their own turf. That was a source of encouragement in itself. Twelve points out of eighteen taken, that constituted a pretty impressive start in my book. Things seemed to be beginning to take shape.

Volyn 0-1 Rukh Vynnyky

Team: Dyachenko, Markovych, I.Bilyi, Duts, Pysko, G.Baranets (Verbnyi), Tkachuk, Grysyo (Lozovyi), B.Baranets (Bidlovskyi), Zubar, Khomchenko

Subs not used: Illyuscehenkov, V.Bilyi, Chepelyuk, Kozlovskyi

Shots: 19 - 6

Shots On Target: 5 -

Possession: 53% - 47%

Link to post
Share on other sites

Saturday 29th July 2017 – Results and Table

Arsenal-Kyiv

0-0

Girnyk-Sport

Balkany Zorya

0-2

Obolon-Brewer

Cherkaskyi Dnipro

2-4

Kolos Kovalivka

Gelios

1-1

Naftovyk-Ukmafta

Kremin

3-1

Ingulets-Petrove

Mykolaiv

0-2

Desna

Poltava

2-1

Sumy

Volyn

0-1

Rukh Vynnyky

Zhemchuzhyna Odesa

3-0

Avangard Kramatorsk

 

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Desna

6

5

1

0

12

5

16

7

Obolon-Brewer

6

5

1

0

8

1

16

7

Rukh Vynnyky

6

4

0

2

8

6

12

2

Kolos Kovalivka

6

3

2

1

11

6

11

5

Gelios

6

3

2

1

5

2

11

3

Volyn

6

3

1

2

7

3

10

4

Zhemchuzhyna Odesa

6

2

3

1

7

4

9

3

Naftovyk-Ukmafta

6

2

3

1

5

4

9

1

Balkany Zorya

6

2

2

2

7

6

8

1

Poltava

6

2

2

2

9

11

8

-2

Avangard Kramatorsk

6

2

1

3

6

7

7

-1

Arsenal-Kyiv

6

1

3

2

7

9

6

-2

Kremin

6

2

0

4

10

14

6

-4

Girnyk-Sport

6

1

2

3

6

7

5

-1

Ingulets Petrove

6

1

1

4

3

8

4

-5

Sumy

6

1

1

4

7

14

4

-7

Mykolaiv

6

0

3

3

2

7

3

-5

Cherkaskyi Dnipro

6

1

0

5

4

10

3

-6

Link to post
Share on other sites

Monday 31st July 2017

 

The end of my first month as a fully-fledged football manager provided a further triumph to add to those that we’d been picking up on the pitch. The interview process had been completed and all vacant positions had been, by the end of the day, filled.

Yulya Veshigora, one of Marina’s associates at her agency, had spent the day with me, just as she had on the Friday, helping with translations and ensuring employment eligibility checks were made to ensure that there would be no barrier to getting people into roles. In her early 30s, with a short naturally ginger pixie cut, Yulya spoke perfect English by way of being born in California as a 4th generation American. Her great-grandparents had emigrated from Kharkiv in the early 1920s, escaping the civil war which engulfed the Soviet Union after the 1917 revolution and set up in San Francisco. Her great-grandfather became a theatre director and her great-grandmother fell pregnant with her paternal grandfather soon after they landed in the Land of the Free.

After her parents split up when she was just starting High School, she found her time split between her Mum, who moved to Lviv with her new man and her Dad, who remained in San Fransisco until university, when she went to the University of St Andrews in Scotland to study some sort of Business degree. After graduation, she moved south of the border to the University of Newcastle to do a Masters in some sort of Business degree (I have no aptitude for anything remotely businessy so it might as well be Aramaic, quite honestly) and it was there that she discovered her love of football by accompanying her boyfriend in the Gallowgate end at St James’ Park.

This I learned during lunch, when I took her to Restaurant Gopak by way of offering her thanks for her help and she talked extensively about her life.  

In fact it turns out that she actively lobbied for this gig helping me out since, in Marina’s words ‘your handsomely languid style of play caught her eye’ when I was playing at Newcastle for Spurs in about 2006. Ever since then, Marina told me, Yulya had kept an eye on my playing progress ever since but had missed the fact that I was now on her doorstep. Until, that is, Marina had mentioned this job to her and Yevgeny at which point ‘her eyes almost exited their sockets on stalks!’

‘I think she’s got a soft spot for you, Paul.’ Marina said when we were tying up loose ends on the phone.

I laughed at the absurdity of that notion.

‘No, honestly, she lights up when she talks about you.’ Marina insisted.

Well, there was nothing doing. As attractive as Yulya was – and she was hugely attractive – there hadn’t been anyone since Lucy, and that had ended seven years ago. There’d been no end of ‘bantz’ from friends and family – even my own mother – about putting myself out there again but, I wasn’t ready. Besides which, Yulya was married and there was no way I was going to play any part in any nonsense in that respect. I’d been on the receiving end when Lucy had left me for one of her colleagues in the police force and had never quite gotten over it if I’m honest. That Lottie seemed to hold me responsible for her Mum’s early death last year following a long-term illness, certainly didn’t help on that score, but ever since we split, my relationship with Lottie started to go south and hadn’t recovered.

At 7pm, I’d convened a meeting in what passed for the player’s / corporate lounge at the stadium of my newly engorged backroom staff. The idea was firstly to introduce everyone (with Grygoriy’s help!) to each-other and then give them some time to mingle and talk informally over a couple of beers. I’d put some money onto a tab, enough for a couple of drinks each, and would make up any shortfall at the evening’s end.

Having performed some rushed introductions at the weekend for Eugene, Vasyl, Andriy, Leonid and Danylo, I spent 10 minutes introducing the four further new faces:

Head of Youth Development – Eugene Skotarenko (40): This was Eugene’s first post in the professional, or even senior game but he was well known for his work in and around Lviv in schools and youth teams. His references spoke very highly of his work, patience and ability to get the best out of those he worked with – even those totally lacking in ability. He would oversee the Under-21s and create a pathway into the first-team from there as well as tip me off for any youngsters he knew that might help the first team.

First Team Coach – Sergiy Diev (59): The appointment of Sergiy felt like a big one. Twice a manager at Sevastapol as well as a lengthy spell coaching at Vorskla in the Ukranian Highest League, there was enormous levels of experience for me to be able to tap into. He had talked about wanting to move away from all the stresses that came with management and just focus on what he does – and loves – best, working with players on the training ground.

Head of Sports Science – Volodymyr Zhavikov (27): Another youngster, but one who had studied and worked with Eugene Barzaka at the University of Lviv and who, I felt, was worth a punt. He was happy with the idea of an initial six-month trial period in which we’d work together to persuade Grygoriy Baranets of his longer-term value.

Scout – Artem Subuchev (39): The final piece of the jigsaw, for now at least. Artem was another to be making his first steps in the professional game but, like Leonid Tyurya, Artem’s new boss, he was a regular at local amateur matches scouting for someone or other and, having provided a couple of samples of his reports with his application, was certainly very thorough in his work.

The evening went well, there was a good hum of conversation and laughter as those that didn’t already know each-other mingled and as they were still going strong at 8:30pm, I slipped out with Olexandr Drachenko to deal with the final couple of pieces of business that would complete a highly productive day.

Firstly, before training a couple of players, defenders Andriy Gurskyi and Volodymyr Makar, who had failed to get near the matchday eighteen so far knocked on my door and stated that they wanted more regular first-team action than they’d seen so far.

Explaining, as best I could, that whilst were in decent form and the back-four were performing relatively well I wasn’t going to break them up just for the sake of giving someone else a chance. They were both going to have to wait for their opportunity patiently and when it arrived, take it with both hands. Sensing by the unhappy looks on their faces that this wasn’t the right answer, I went on to offer both the chance of seeking temporary moves away from the Bohdan Markevych with the proviso that they could be recalled if we needed. That seemed to do the trick.

‘Da, da!’ they both nodded almost in unison and with matching enthusiasm. ‘Perfect, Mister Tilletson. Perfect.’

And with that, I managed to get, with the aid of Drachenko, a memo out around all clubs at our level and below (circulating their names to Highest League clubs seemed a bit of a punt not worth taking) and within hours, we had firm offers in from Poltava for Gurskyi and Naftan for Makar. Drachenko had let the players know and it was now down to them and the two clubs to discuss terms.

There were a couple of positives for the club to be had as well as the individuals if the deals went through. Firstly, if we did need to recall them for any reason, they’d be able to slot into the side without needing to find match fitness (assuming they were regulars for the clubs, of course), but we’d also managed to get both clubs to cover the players’ wages in their entirety for the time that they were away. That freed up a little bit for me to try and cover a couple of areas where I felt we were short of cover.

Whilst that was all bubbling away in the background, in the office we met up with the player that Leonid had recommended to us before the weekend to finalise details on a two-year contract. He’d joined us for training during the day and looked good, certainly seemed to offer something a little different to what we had already up front – more of a physical presence and, perhaps most importantly, a nose for goal.

Monetarily, he wouldn’t be that well off, but as Leonid had hinted, he had just wanted the chance to get some football under his belt and see where it took him. Within a quarter of an hour, the contract that Grygoriy had managed to get drawn up had been signed by all parties, hands had been shaken and I’d made my first ever new signing.

Vladyslav Bugay (or Buhay, depending on which version of the spelling one went with) was a 19-year old striker who had spent time at Dynamo Kyiv as a young teen before moving to Shakhtar following a family move and joining their academy. During the previous season, he had been on-loan to FC Bukovyna Chernivtsi but struggled to make much of an impact as the side were relegated from the First League. On a personal level, he scored just once in 23 appearances, but, Leonid said that ‘he had visibly developed in that time and was a much better player at the end of the season than he was at the start. He just lacked confidence in front of goal. If he’s loved, he will score, no question.’ With our current strike-force looking somewhat anaemic, he felt like a low-risk punt worth taking a chance on. He’d be in the squad for the midweek visit of Poltava, at that point I wasn’t sure if he’d be starting or on the bench. That was a decision that I’d take on the day.

Link to post
Share on other sites

7.       Ukrainian First League: Rukh Vynnyky v Poltava (2nd August 2017)

My new face started on the bench.

I thought it best not to change a winning side even if I objectively thought that Bugay would offer more than Khomchenko alongside Svyatoslav Zubar up front, with the boys having put in an impressive performance against Volyn at the weekend, I was loathed on this occasion to chop and change for the sake of it. That was a habit I would quickly dismiss.

The temptation to present him to the crowd before kick-off was one that quickly passed on the basis that it’d look somewhat absurd for him to meekly wave to a couple of hundred largely disinterested punters widely dispersed in a stand that had twice as many empty seats as occupied ones. Instead, there was a page on him in the matchday programme meaning that those that had a interest would be able to appreciate the virtues of our new man – on paper at least.

Speaking of paper, a couple of hours before kick-off, we’d been able to complete the paperwork for the loan move of Andriy Gurskyi in person to our opponents and submitted it to the Ukrainian Football Federation. We could have completed things the day before as we did with Volodymyr Makar’s move to Naftan (in the Belarussian second tier), but since Gurskyi would have been ineligible either way to play against us, the 24-hour delay didn’t matter. Makar, however, would make his Naftan debut that evening.

Poltava were coming into the game safely sat in mid-table with a record that would have brought a smile to the faces of Danny Baker and Bob Mills – win, lose or draw in equal measure. Two of each at this early stage of the season. Their 8 points had them sat in 10th place, whilst we were 3rd, four points better off. On the road they’d won one – against Ingulets Petrove – and lost two, against Obolon-Brewer and Kolos Kovalivka whilst on their own patch they remained undefeated and could boast being the one side so far to take any points off Desna in a thrilling 3-3 draw. At the weekend they’d beaten strugglers Sumy by the odd goal in three, leaving me to anticipate yet another tough task ahead of us.

Our opponents were another bunch of Johnny-come-latelys to the Ukranian football world, much like ourselves, having been formed in 2007. They had been formed with the intention of providing local talent with a pathway from local football into the professional game and, reinstating the Poltava derby which had taken place between Vorskla and the defunct Lokomotyv.

Gaining promotion to the First League in the summer of 2012 after three seasons of going very close, aside from a fourth-placed finish in 2013/4, their five seasons at this level had seen them hovering around the bottom half of the table, but away from the relegation dogfight. Indeed, the previous season had seen them reach the quarter-finals of the Ukrainian Cup, a run which had ended at the hands of Shakhtar in controversial circumstances.

The game had been due to be played at Poltava’s Lokomotiv stadium but with the pitch in, what the local press even admitted was a ‘state that resembled a Napoleonic battlefield’ the game never took place and Shakhtar were awarded a 3-0 victory.

Indeed, Poltava were no strangers to controversy. In 2010, having cited a perceived bias against them from referees and the PFL (Professional Football League) of Ukraine, they withdrew from professional competition. Only after talks with various officials within the Government and, prominently the Ministry of Sport, did the club receive enough reassurance to rescind their withdrawal and continue competing.

As I said, the starting XI remained the same as it had been at the weekend for the impressive win over Volyn. I felt that whilst the boys were adapting to a new system, keeping the side as settled as possible, by and large, was worth doing, particularly whilst winning games. So, we started thus:

Olexandr Dyachenko

Andriy Markovych           Ivan Bilyi             Igor Duts              Mykhaylo Pysko

Yuriy Tkachuk ©              Grygoriy Baranets

Maxym Grysyo                                                                                 Borys Baranets

Svyatoslav Zubar              Victor Khomchenko

The one decision I’d had to make was over whom to partner with Zubar and, on this occasion, I chose the incumbent, Victor Khomchenko. As well as not disrupting a winning side, leaving Vladyslav on the bench would give him a chance to see us in action, to gauge things before taking his place on the pitch.

We began well on another mild, but blustery evening, with a confidence and aura that had come with winning four of the previous five matches and knowing that the players now all belonged at this level. Stroking the ball about neatly and creating a couple of decent openings in the opening fifteen minutes, lax finishing meant that Maxym Kuchynskyi had to do little more than field overhit through balls or taking goal-kicks.

With the first half drifting towards its midway point, Borys Baranets retreated twenty yards from the Poltava penalty area and knocked the ball eventually back to Myhaylo Pysko. The left-back played it forward to Grygoriy Baranets in space, thirty-five yards from goal and spotting the run off the shoulder of the centre-half by Svyatoslav Zubar and the fact that the black and white shirted left-back was playing the striker on-side inside the penalty area and threaded a lovely pass into his path with his left foot. Zubar opened up his body and as the ball arrived across him, swivelled and unleashed a brilliant strike that flew beyond Kuchynskyi and into the top corner of the net to put us ahead. It was a super goal, well crafted and brilliantly executed and as I applauded, I looked up into the main stand and saw the unmistakeable figure of Vasyl Makarov leading the celebrations.

Six and a half minutes later, a strike from Poltava’s Oleg Barannik was blocked by Igor Duts and broke nicely for Borys Baranets. The left winger played the ball forward towards halfway where it was collected by Zubar. Play continued as Baranets collapsed appeared to tweak something on his follow through and made his way gingerly forward in support. I immediately readied Volodymyr Bidlovskyi to come on, not wanting to take any risks on any knock, tweak or twinge.

Meanwhile, Zubar had lifted the ball forward for Khomchenko, a dozen yards inside the opposing half, and he took the ball neatly on his chest, no-one within three or four yards. That allowed him to move forward ten or fifteen yards and then send a pass inside the out-of-position right-back, Yuriy Sents’kyi who had bombed forward and allowed Borys Baranets, still clearly hobbling, in space outside the left edge of the penalty area. With the freedom of the city of Lviv in which to get the ball under control and then pick out a cross to the far post, Baranets’ final act of the evening was to provide Zubar with the chance to thunder a header into the net off the underside of the crossbar from inside the six-yard box at the far post. Whilst the majority of those within the ground were saluting the extension of our advantage, I was busy readying Bidlovskyi to replace the creator of the goal before the restart. Like for like, it shouldn’t upset us too much.

The time ticked over from the 32nd to the 33rd minute and a Poltava free-kick in a good position appeared to have broken down. Yuriy Tkachuk picked up possession and took a touch but was then unceremoniously challenged by Olexiy Savchenko who then found himself outpacing Andriy Markovych and then firing an angled shot slightly wildly, high and wide of the target. The finish didn’t match the impressive single-mindedness that created the opening.

Three minutes before the break, another free kick into our penalty area was headed on by Sents’kyi. Ivan Bilyi looked to clear but only thumped it against the rump of the remaining Baranets lad a couple of yards in front of him. The ball fell nicely for centre-half Vadym Paramonov to fire a first-time left footed shot from 15-yards out that beat Dyachenko and, thankfully, his left-hand post.

‘Boys, keep focused.’ I said at the break once everyone had got their drinks and were sat down looking at me attentively. ‘2-0 is good, very good. But remain watchful.’ I pointed my index fingers at my temples to emphasise the point. ‘Yes?’

‘Da!’ came the response. I was getting better at communicating with them – more familiarity with my slightly ludicrous mannerisms and an ever-improving level of the native language.

The second half was almost a perfect display of how to see a game out professionally. There were one or two half chances at either end, but nothing that troubled either goalkeeper until the 75th minute when finally, Barannik broke clear of the shackles he’d been placed in Duts and Bilyi, racing fifty yards down the left flank. Lacking support, he had the presence of mind to cut the ball back outside the penalty area rather than pumping it aimlessly into the penalty area where it was met first time on the full by Anton Savin, 25-yards out. Dyachenko was rooted to the spot a couple of yards off his line as the ball dipped viciously. The sigh of relief was audible and palpable as it skidded off the roof of the net and thudded into the fence behind the goal.

Phew!

Conceding a goal then would have made for a tense closing fifteen minutes. That miss, however, seemed to deflate the visitors and the final stages were fairly comfortable.

In the second of four minutes of stoppage time, Khomchenko had a tame shot nick off a defender and go wide for a corner. Bidlovskyi’s delivery was headed clear by a defender but only as far as substitute Nazar Verbnyi, who had replaced the other Baranets with twenty-five minutes remaining. Verbnyi’s clipped cross to the far post was met by Ivan Bilyi whose header back across goal looped over Kuchynskyi and into the net for a third goal which provided not only some gloss to the score-line, but also proved a little flattering.

Or so we thought.

Celebrations were cut short once again by the assistant’s flag and the goal was chalked off.

Two minutes later the final whistle went bringing with it our third straight win and cementing our place in the top-3. We were still four points behind Desna and Obolon-Brewer who, I quickly learned, had also won, but with a fifth of the season now behind us, we were looking in good shape as things stood and, surely, about 40% of the way to claiming enough points to secure safety.

A workmanlike performance that was full of assuredness and all the more impressive for it. I was more than happy as I went around the dressing room high fiving and shaking hands. With a weekend visit ahead to bottom of the table Cherkaskyi Dnipro, we had a great chance to extend our run of successes.

Rukh Vynnyky 2-0 Poltava

Team: Dyachenko, Markovych, I.Bilyi, Duts, Pysko, G.Baranets (Verbnyi), Tkachuk, Grysyo (Lozovyi), B.Baranets (Bidlovskyi), Zubar, Khomchenko

Subs not used: Illyuscehenkov, V.Bilyi, Chepelyuk, Bugay

Shots: 12 - 8

Shots On Target: 3 - 2

Possession: 58% - 42%

Link to post
Share on other sites

Wednesday 2nd August 2017 – Results and Table

Avangard Kramatorsk

2-3

Volyn

Desna

2-0

Balknay Zorya

Ingulets Petrove

0-0

Mykolaiv

Kolos Kovalivka

1-1

Gelios

Naftovyk-Ukmafta

2-3

Kremin

Obolon-Brewer

2-1

Girnyk-Sport

Rukh Vynnyky

2-0

Poltava

Sumy

2-1

Cherkaskyi Dnipro

Zhemchuzhyna Odesa

0-2

Arsenal-Kyiv

 

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Desna

7

6

1

0

14

5

19

9

Obolon-Brewer

7

6

1

0

10

2

19

8

Rukh Vynnyky

7

5

0

2

10

6

15

4

Volyn

7

4

1

2

10

5

13

5

Kolos Kovalivka

7

3

3

1

12

7

12

5

Gelios

7

3

3

1

6

3

12

3

Zhemchuzhyna Odesa

7

2

3

2

7

6

9

1

Arsenal-Kyiv

7

2

3

2

9

9

9

0

Naftovyk-Ukmafta

7

2

3

2

7

7

9

0

Kremin

7

3

0

4

13

17

9

-4

Balkany Zorya

7

2

2

3

7

8

8

-1

Poltava

7

2

2

3

9

13

8

-4

Avangard Kramatorsk

7

2

1

4

8

10

7

-2

Sumy

7

2

1

4

9

15

7

-6

Girnyk-Sport

7

1

2

4

7

9

5

-2

Ingulets Petrove

7

1

2

4

3

8

5

-5

Mykolaiv

7

0

4

3

2

7

4

-5

Cherkaskyi Dnipro

7

1

0

6

5

12

3

-7

Link to post
Share on other sites

8.       Ukrainian First League: Cherkaskyi Dnipro v Rukh Vynnyky (5th August 2017)

The win against Poltava came at a price. Arriving at the ground on the Thursday morning, I was greeted by Borys Baranets limping heavily in the car-park. He’d just finished receiving some treatment from Vasyl Filvarkorvyi.

‘Well, Borys. How is it?’ I asked, braving some Ukrainian.

‘They think three weeks,’ Borys replied, ‘perhaps two if I react well to the treatment. It’s my hamstring.’ A quizzical look across my face prompted him to rub the back of his left thigh. ‘It’s only a pull, not a tear thankfully.’ Again, with the help of some sign language he conveyed the meaning. That would keep him out of action for anything between four and half a dozen matches, a big blow considering his experience and creative quality. Just as he’d been settling into our shape and started to provide some goals and assists.

Knowing how difficult it can be for players who suffer injuries during their rehabilitation, even relatively minor knocks such as this one, not to feel a bit isolated and unwanted. Some managers I’d played under (not naming any names) would literally ignore you if you were unfit since you were of no use to them. Old school, perhaps, but lacking in a bit of human decency too. ‘Don’t be a stranger,’ I said, ‘come along to training and into the dressing room on match-days if you want to.’

Borys thanked me and we parted with a hand clasp.

I’d been extremely fortunate in getting this far through an intense period without anyone picking up an injury that had required them to miss games. One can only imagine the kind of hyperbolic frenzy messrs Wenger or Allardyce would have whipped themselves into at the prospect of having to play seven matches inside the space of four weeks, but for these boys, they’d taken everything in their stride and looked after themselves extremely well.

Injuries are often used as an excuse for when a club goes on a bad run or to try and paint a point or win as being against the odds. “We’re down to the bare bones,” is a familiar cry from managers and coaches across the continent, “I’ve only got 16 fit lads training out there,” is another from guys that have 35 or more paid professionals on their books. My take on it has always been that one man’s injury is another man’s opportunity and that unless you’re very unfortunate in having maybe four or five players out that play in the same position, there should be someone ready to step-in and give their all.

In this case, the beneficiary of Borys’ pulled hamstring would be Volodymyr Bidlovskyi, a 29-year old left winger who was a local lad made good initially with Karpaty Lviv, before spells at Olexandriya, Krymtepyltsya and latterly Obolon-Brewer, and also able to play at left-back as well. Although not as naturally comfortable in a more advanced position where the winger played high on the toes of the opposition full-back as Borys – he preferred to run at his opponent from a slightly deeper area and look to use his pace to go past his man – he knew what was expected of him and I had every confidence in him not to let us down. He had more than 200 league appearances to his name so nerves shouldn’t be a problem.

Aside from that enforced change, the side pretty well picked itself for the visit to the banks of the Dnieper River and early basement dwellers Cherkaskyi Dnipro. Svyastoslav Zubar’s midweek brace had given him a stay of execution and a much-improved showing from Victor Khomchenko meant that he kept his place alongside the new top-scorer. Vladyslav Bugay would have to remain champing at the bit on the substitutes bench for a little longer.

Just for a change, the club’s origins are shrouded in mystery and confusion, however the current guise were formed in 2010 allegedly as a replacement for FC Khodak Cherkaskyi, who had been a works club at a local food factory. As with so many of these ‘new’ clubs, Cherkaskyi Dnipro had enjoyed a fairly meteoric rise into the 2nd tier and this season, their third at this level, was shaping up to be their toughest. A runners-up finish in their inaugural campaign was followed by a mid-table showing in 2016/7, this time around their return of three points and six defeats from their opening seven matches suggested a long hard year lay ahead. Of course, it was still early days, but it’s not often a side has such a calamitous start to a season and manages to salvage survival.

Their solitary win had come in the curtain-raiser on the road, beating Girnyk-Sport 2-1, since then they’d lost their next half-dozen games conceding 11 goals in the process. For the first time, I really felt that we were going into the fixture as favourites and I actually expected us to come away with the three points. The analysis work that Danylo had done on them showed that they were in a little bit of disarray and that almost half of the dozen goals they’d conceded had come from down their opponent’s right flank.

A 10-hour drive of around 700km saw us arrive at the Tsentralnyi Stadium (Central Stadium) in the city of Cherkaskyi, a bowl unusual in that there was seating around the entire perimeter, more than 10,000 of them coloured either blue or red. It felt a little like the Crystal Palace athletics stadium, or Gateshead or the Don Valley back at home with the open-air seats separated from the playing field by a running track – the difference though was that there would have been a high likelihood of Tony Jarrett or Marlon Devonish wrecking their ankles had the AAA Championships even been held on the banks of the Dnieper such was the pockmarked and uneven running surface.

Thankfully, the green field was in much better condition and, when walking on it an hour and a half prior to kick off, I considered that it was the first surface I’d come across that made me want to dust off my boots again.  

Naming the side, there were no surprises to be had. The only addition to the previously named 18 was the introduction of young attacking midfielder Yuriy Kopyna on the bench to fill the gap created by Borys’ injury – a promising young 21-year old, Yuriy was the kind of talent I’d have liked to have begun to introduce into the side. He’d already made a dozen appearances for the club and had plenty of ability, the problem was that he just wanted to play in a centrally attacking midfield role. Attempts at asking him to play wider on either flank, or deeper in a more conventional midfield role in training just ended with him reverting to type. Fitting him into the system was going to be no easy task.

The team selected was:

Olexandr Dyachenko

Andriy Markovych           Ivan Bilyi             Igor Duts              Mykhaylo Pysko

Yuriy Tkachuk ©              Grygoriy Baranets

Maxym Grysyo                                                                                 Volodymyr Bidlovskyi

Svyatoslav Zubar              Victor Khomchenko

‘We should be winning today,’ I told them as they finished their preparations, taping up socks and applying deep heat and liniment here and there. ‘They’ve lost their last six, we’ve won our last three. If you keep focused up here,’ I pointed to my temple, ‘and smart down here,’ I pointed at my feet, ‘they won’t be able to live with you.’

‘Maxym,’ I looked at the right-winger. ‘Danyl has spoken with you, yes?’ The on-loan Karpaty man nodded. I’d asked Danylo along on the trip and to take a bit of time sitting with Maxym to show him some clips of where he should be able to find some joy. ‘Good, you can have a lot of fun here tonight.’

‘Enjoy yourselves, lads, and bring back those three points. Yes?!’

The response was rousing, rabble-rousing almost and they seemed up for the task ahead.

We began well, knocking the ball around confidently, keeping possession and working the opposition in search of a gap. Although little was created in the opening ten minutes, I was pleased with the mild swagger we were showing. Not arrogance, but an assertiveness that we were setting out our stall to leave with the three points.

Andriy Markovych played a pass inside for Yuriy Tkachuk who, entering the centre circle laid the ball to Grysyo on the right-hand side in plenty of space. Sergiy Ichanskyi, the Cherkaskyi left-back had stood-off his man and provided him with an enormous area to run into and so, that’s what he did, heading towards the touchline before at pace, as Ichanskyi came to engage him, sending in a cross from deep towards the heart of the penalty area. Khomchenko got across his man and glanced a header towards goal that Eugene Panchenko reacted well to block. Khomchenko, showing himself to be alert, pounced on the loose ball before it crossed the by-line and managed to cut it back for the waiting and unmarked Svyatoslav Zubar to tap into the inviting net for his fourth goal of the season and to give us the early advantage.

Everyone on the bench was on their feet and after taking the congratulations of half-a-dozen people alongside me, I turned around and glanced at Danylo, who looked up from his lap-top just long enough to catch my eye. A wryly raised eyebrow on his part was returned by a thumbs up from myself.

If we expected our opponents to roll over and have their bellies tickled, we were soon put straight on that count. After Anton Kramar’s free-kick from the right edge of our penalty area was only partially dealt with, Ichanskyi’s impudent backheel inside the box was met by Ruslan Sutchenko first time. His left footed shot was headed in, no question, were it not for a wonderful save by Dyachenko at full-stretch to his left, pushing the ball around the post for a corner. Thankfully, the set-piece came to nothing and we were able this time, to properly clear our lines.

The renaissance continued when a break from the hosts’ lone striker, Ruslan Kachur, ended with him firing a powerful shot wildly off-target but that was enough for me to nudge Olexandr Drachenko gently in the ribs. He turned to me.

‘Tell Yuriy and Grygoriy to start getting a grip in midfield!’

Without needing a second invitation, my number two was on his feet and barking instructions like a Baskervillian hound.

It worked.

For the next fifteen-twenty minutes we managed to wrestle back control of the game. Ten minutes before the break Igor Duts had the ball in the net but the whistle had already gone for offside against the centre-half as he turned in Ivan Bilyi’s flick-on from Bidlovskyi’s cross and then in the final minute of the half we spurned a golden chance to go into the break 2-0 up.

A long hopeful ball from Mykaylo Pysko was being dealt with by Oleg Tasarenko just inside his own penalty area. Khomchenko was sniffing around and appeared to clip the heels of the centre-half. As he went down, the referee waved play on giving Khomchenko a brilliant opportunity to score. Panchenko came out to narrow the angle and did well, but you’d have backed any striker worth his salt to have scored. Khomchenko didn’t, the goalkeeper making a block whilst spreading himself and deflecting the ball out for a corner to keep his side alive.

At the break I re-emphasised the need to be watchful defensively and to be better in front of their goal, otherwise I was perfectly pleased with how we were doing. Getting the second goal would help to kill off their threat and the sooner that happened, the better for all of us.

Within a minute of the restart we should have had it. Again, the threat came down our right and again, Grysyo sent a gorgeous cross into the heart of the penalty area. Panchenko came out but was outjumped by Khomchenko who, somehow, from all of three yards out headed against the crossbar rather than underneath it. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing and immediately sent Vladyslav Bugay out to warm up.

I made the change on the hour mark, Bugay on for Khomchenko, just after we’d almost been made to pay for those missed opportunities. From our own attacking free-kick, taken by Baranets, a headed clearance led to a swift counter-attack led by Kramar. He fed the ball to the pacey winger Levan Koshadze who, looked to take on Markovych in a foot-race. It was one that the Georgian won, getting into the penalty area but Markovych had done enough to force the attacker onto his weaker right-foot. His effort from 14 yards flew over the bar when at the very least, he should have hit the target and made Dyachenko make a save.

The next twenty minutes were rather more fraught than I’d have liked and with the game entering the final ten minutes of the ninety, I don’t mind admitting that I’d begun to chew on my nails and run my hand through my beard with ever more angst.

Eight minutes remained when a Bidlovskyi corner from the right was headed away towards the edge of the penalty area, only as far as Zubar who, with one measured touch rolled the ball into the path of Grysyo. There was a host of players between him and the goal, but undeterred, Grysyo struck the ball first time towards goal. Panchenko must have been slightly unsighted because he dived a fraction too late and although he go a strong hand to the shot, it squirmed beyond him and into the net to extend our lead.

‘F*cking BOOM!’ I exploded, leaping into the air and punching it at the same time with quite the uppercut. It was a reaction borne as much from relief as elation, surely now we could relax a little?

Less than 90 seconds later we could relax a lot. Bidlovskyi received the ball down the left and headed towards the by-line. Given a couple of yards of space, he dug out a lovely swinging cross which was met at the near-post by a glancing Bugay header. Whether he was going for goal or not wasn’t clear, but if he was, what turned out to be an errant effort at goal turned into a finely judged assist as arriving of the blindside of Ichanskyi was Grysyo again to slide the ball in from an acute angle and make it 3-0.

That was the three points secured. Olexandr Kolos fired over the top when well placed and Kuchar struck the crossbar with a header in the dying seconds as the hosts went in search of a consolation goal, but none was forthcoming.

The official’s whistle brought with it our best win of the season so far in terms of score-line and, pleasingly, something of a little bit of a tactical masterplan playing itself out thanks to the hard work of Danylo Monotenko. His was the first drink I bought after the game in the lounge to thank him for his efforts.

‘You’ve set high standards now, Danny.’ I told him, handing him a beer. The young man almost blushed, as if unused to receiving praise.

‘It is just my job,’ he replied, humbly.

‘Well, keep up the good work!’ We clinked glasses and I went off to find out what had happened in the other results. We were still 3rd, but with Desna losing and Obolon-Brewer being held to a goal-less draw, the gap was down to two points. Of course, it was too early to even begin to consider the prospect of promotion, but the fact that we were so close to the top of the table made reaching the summit rather a tantalising prospect. Before we could consider that, though, we had the little matter of our entry into the national cup to overcome in midweek.

Cherkaskyi Dnipro 0-3 Rukh Vynnyky

Team: Dyachenko, Markovych, I.Bilyi, Duts, Pysko, G.Baranets (Verbnyi), Tkachuk, Grysyo  Bidlovskyi, Zubar, Khomchenko (Bugay)

Subs not used: Illyuscehenkov, Kopyna, V.Bilyi, Chepelyuk, Lozovyi

Shots: 10 - 14

Shots On Target: 2 - 7

Possession: 48% - 52%

Link to post
Share on other sites

Saturday 5th August 2017 – Results and Table

Arsenal-Kyiv

0-0

Obolon-Brewer

Balknay Zorya

2-1

Ingulets Petrove

Cherkaskyi Dnipro

0-3

Rukh Vynnyky

Gelios

0-0

Sumy

Girnyk-Sport

2-1

Desna

Kremin

2-3

Kolos Kovalivka

Mykolaiv

0-2

Naftovyk-Ukmafta

Poltava

2-0

Avangard Kramatorsk

Volyn

2-0

Zhemchuzhyna Odesa

 

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Obolon-Brewer

8

6

2

0

10

2

20

8

Desna

8

6

1

1

15

7

19

8

Rukh Vynnyky

8

6

0

2

13

6

18

7

Volyn

8

5

1

2

12

5

16

7

Kolos Kovalivka

8

4

3

1

15

9

15

6

Gelios

8

3

4

1

6

3

13

3

Naftovyk-Ukmafta

8

3

3

2

9

7

12

2

Balkany Zorya

8

3

2

3

9

9

11

0

Poltava

8

3

2

3

11

13

11

-2

Arsenal-Kyiv

8

2

4

2

9

9

10

0

Zhemchuzhyna Odesa

8

2

3

3

7

8

9

-1

Kremin

8

3

0

5

15

20

9

-5

Girnyk-Sport

8

2

2

4

9

10

8

-1

Sumy

8

2

2

4

9

15

8

-6

Avangard Kramatorsk

8

2

1

5

8

12

7

-4

Ingulets Petrove

8

1

2

5

4

10

5

-6

Mykolaiv

8

0

4

4

2

9

4

-7

Cherkaskyi Dnipro

8

1

0

7

5

15

3

-10

Link to post
Share on other sites

9.      Ukrainian Cup, 2nd Preliminary Round: Energiya NK v Rukh Vynnyky (9th August 2017)

The Ukrainian equivalent of the big velvet bag and a number of balls being rummaged and fondled by Martin Keown and Jason Roberts in plain sight of Mark ‘Chappers’ Chapman had seen us drawn away from home in the 2nd Preliminary round of the national cup against Second League side Energiya of Nova Kakhovka.

Being paired with a side from a lower division gave rise to the temptation of providing some of the fringe players ‘vital minutes’ in the tie to ensure that if they were called upon to step in at any stage to deputise for a regular that was injured or suspended, then they would at least do so with ‘minutes under their belts’. There was a danger, I knew only too well, of making too many changes and ending up with egg dripping down my chin as a side I named that on paper was well good enough to progress, ended up being well and truly humbled.

To that end, after training the afternoon before the game, I asked five regulars (Olexandr Dyachenko, Ivan Bilyi, Yuriy Tkachuk, Maxym Grysyo and Victor Khomchenko) to stay behind for a chat. We were in the dressing room, they were all showered and changed, ready to head home and sitting down at their pegs. Once Eugene Lozovyi, always the last to finish preening his hair, had departed I shut the door and hopped onto the physio’s bed which was in the centre of the room.

‘Okay, lads,’ I began in English. I had Danny Monotenko with me since he had shown himself to be fairly good with English and so would be able to translate for me. ‘I’ve asked you to stay behind just so I can let you know myself that tomorrow I’ll be making a few changes to the side and that you won’t be starting.

‘This isn’t you fellas being dropped or anything like that, indeed, except for yourself, Yuriy and you, Victor, the other three of you will be named on the bench in case we need you. Instead, this is just a chance for me to give some minutes to other lads and see how they get on.’ I looked around the room as Danny translated for me. ‘Any questions?’

Dyachenko raised his hand. ‘Is it just for this game? At the weekend we’ll be back in the side?’

‘Well, I can’t guarantee that. If whoever comes in for you ends up putting in a top-class performance then that’d be something I’d need to consider going forward, but the likelihood is that yes, you fellas will be back in the XI for the Gelios game.’ I didn’t tell Victor that actually, there was every chance that if his understudy, Vladyslav Bugay did well then he’d keep his place – now wasn’t the time – I’d deal with that delicate matter another time. ‘Anyone else?’ No-one moved. ‘Okay, thanks boys. I appreciate your time. See you tomorrow.’

***

As with so many sides we’d already met and many more that I would go on to meet over the years, Energiya’s roots lay in being a works side, in this case representing the hydro-electric power station that was situated on the Dnieper River and formed in 1952, the same year that the city of Nova Kakhovka was founded.

The power plant had been in situ since the late 1940s and the city was built to service the needs of the plant, housing workers and engineers. The name Nova Kakhovka was chosen to distinguish it from the existing city of Kakhovka, which lies some 15km away, and simply means New Kakhovka. The city has been recognised as the Monument of Architecture and was part of the Great Construction Projects of Communism programme of works that were initiated by Stalin in the early 1950s. As a planned new town, like Stevenage or Milton Keynes back at home, Nova Kakhovka was comparatively architecturally quite interesting and not the square, drab, grey concrete jungle that one might have expected of a Communist construction project.

Situated on the eastern banks of the Dnieper River, about 300km south of Cherkaskyi there was plenty of greenery, arches aplenty and parks, a charming Orthodox Cathedral and a main entrance to the stadium which had 5 large arches and a couple of spires at each end. It rather put our much more spartan home in the shade. Charming, yet one didn’t need to try too hard to imagine the charm, the grandiose facades to be exactly that. A façade that was showing off communism to be everything the secretariat wanted people to think it was – every bit as beautiful and affluent as capitalism – and with the bonus of being ‘for the people’. Of course, the reality was all rather more banal and, well, difficult. I was learning that quite quickly.

The welcome, was impossibly warm and the changed XI took to the field for the warm-up with more than 1500 already milling about the ground. Of course, with the club effectively still representing the hydro-electric powerplant by way of it being by far and away the biggest employer in the area, even now, there were plenty of workers here to watch their side take on ourselves who, in this particular scenario, were the favourites from the big city. It felt like a strangely absurd situation to find ourselves in having by and large been underdogs in pretty much every game to this point. At least in my mind, anyway.

Olexandr Ilyushcenkov

 

Andriy Markovych           Olexandr Chepelyuk       Igor Duts ©        Mykhaylo Pysko

 

Nazar Verbnyi   Grygoriy Baranets

 

Eugene Lozovyi                                                                 Volodymyr Bidlovskyi

 

Svyatoslav Zubar              Vladyslav Bugay

 

The five changes saw Olexandr Ilyuschenkov take the gloves, Olexandr Chepelyuk come in alongside Igor Duts at centre half, Nazar Verbnyi return in the middle of the park alongside the fit Baranets, Eugene Lozovyi come in down the right flank for Maxym Grysyo and Vladyslav Bugay replace Victor Khomchenko up front. Volodymyr Bidlovskyi continued down the left flank in place of the still crocked unfit Baranets – Dyachenko, Grysyo and Ivan Bilyi were on the bench whilst I’d given Tkachuk and Khomchenko leave to come and watch from the stands or take the evening off. Both came and watched, gratifyingly.

In the first minute of action, we came close to opening the scoring. Verbnyi collected the ball in the centre circle from Lozovyi and drove forward. Bugay peeled off his marker and received the ball into feet, took one touch to control, another to set himself and from just inside the D on the edge of the Energiya penalty area, fired a strike that beat the dive of Tymofiy Syzyi in the home goal and sniffed against the outside of the post on it’s way wide. A decent start from my new signing.

In the 7th minute a free kick from the left-flank was floated in nicely by Verbnyi towards the far post. Bugay got up above his marker to head the ball back across goal for Zubar to meet with a header, but it was straight at Syzyi and the goalkeeper made a simple enough save. Promising signs so far.

Five minutes later, we were hit with a blow when Lozovyi was injured in a heavy tackle by Taras Khvasta and he immediately knew his evening was over. On all fours he looked up at the bench and sadly shook his head.

‘Maxym!’ I shouted to Grysyo. ‘Get stripped.’

Eugene was clearly in a lot of discomfort and holding his ribs as he came off. Any degree of movement had him yelping in pain like a dog in a bed of stinging nettles, so I told Vasyl to get him straight into the dressing room and off to hospital for some X-Rays. I suspected he might have, at the very least, cracked ribs and in actual fact, it turned out they were fractured. A real blow for the lad considering he’d been patiently awaiting his chance, but such is football.

We continued to be on top, controlling the tempo and having most of the ball – on 19 minutes Markovych laid the ball inside for Verbnyi, who was enjoying himself in the opening stages, and again he drove forward. Bugay’s movement was once again excellent and as he peeled off his marker, Verbnyi’s ball was perfect. From no more than 7 or 8 yards out, Bugay failed to get enough power or direction on his left-footed effort and Syzyi was able to fall to his left and make a good save.

6 minutes later, a ball forward from Chepelyuk was misjudged by the Energiya centre-half and Bugay, sensing a chance, galloped onto the loose ball. Haring towards the penalty area he could easily have gone for goal himself but instead sensed Svyatoslav Zubar steaming up in support to his right. Drawing the goalkeeper out of position slightly by moving left, Bugay shifted the ball right into the path of Zubar who just had to hit the target to score. He didn’t. He fired his low shot first time and inches wide of the near post when, if he’d taken a touch, he would surely have scored. This number of squandered chances was beginning to get on my wick.

With five minutes of the opening 45 remaining, Verbnyi again, showing his ever-growing influence on proceedings, received the ball from Zubar, who had held it up well, and approached the edge of the penalty area. A neat pass slipped in Bidlovskyi down the inside-left channel and the winger from the by-line cut the ball back into the heart of the 6-yard box just in front of Bugay, but right onto the foot of Zubar who had the simplest of tasks to tap the ball home to break the deadlock.

At sodding last, we’d gotten the breakthrough. The main question was now, would this see the floodgates open?

On the stroke of half-time a floated ball forward by Markovych in behind saw Bugay clear on goal once again. This time, with no support, he had to go himself and he elected to get an early shot off from 20-yards. He beat Syzyi alright, but he also beat the right-hand post and saw the ball agonisingly thud into the advertising hoardings behind the goal.

Then, in the third minute of stoppage time, Baranets sent Bidlovskyi scampering down the left flank once more and his cross again, was low and true into the 6-yard box. It was a striker’s dream and as it fell for Zubar, I have to confess I was off the bench ready to greet a goal. Somehow, though, Syzyi had managed to spread himself and make a quite astounding block to keep his side alive in the tie. A brilliant piece of goalkeeping.

So, it was 1-0 at the break and with even half-decent finishing, it could be four. That wasn’t an altogether unfamiliar tale up to this point of the season. At the break I encouraged and cajoled. ‘Just get the second goal and the game will be won.’ I told them.

As it happened after the break, the flow of clear-cut chances completely dried up. Aside from a Bugay header from a Grysyo cross which clipped the outside of the post on its way behind for a goal-kick, the only incident of note in the entire 45-minutes came two minutes from time when an aerial challenge between Bugay and Kostyantyn Malysh saw both men collapse in a heap and, after a three-minute stoppage, be helped from the field leaving both sides to play out the remaining few minutes with 10-men. Bugay had pulled ankle ligaments as the two men fell whilst his opposite number had done his knee ligaments when taking off to win the header.

It was a fairly ignominious end to a drab period of football in which, we’d won and been in complete control, never really been overly threatened and yet hadn’t hit our straps at all. Still, progression was key at this point and we were into the 1st round proper of the draw. I awaited the draw the following morning with interest.

Energiya NK 0-1 Rukh Vynnyky

 

Team: Ilyuschenkov, Markovych, Chepelyuk, Duts, Pysko, G.Baranets (Panasyuk), Verbnyi, Lozovyi (Grysyo), Bidlovskyi, Zubar (Kozlovskyi), Bugay

Subs not used: Dyachenko, Kopyna, V.Bilyi, I.Bilyi

Shots: 6 - 21

Shots On Target: 4 - 9

Possession: 40% - 60%

Link to post
Share on other sites

Friday 11th August 2017

It had been just over six weeks since taking the Rukh job and I was beginning to feel exhausted. I don’t mind admitting that I was woefully underprepared for just how intense and non-stop football management was. I’d spoken to former managers I’d played under and former team-mates who had gone into management or coaching and although they’d all talked about the huge number of demands made on one’s time and the fact that the job literally played on one’s mind 24-hours a day, 7-days a week.

Take this Friday for example.

6am: Wake up and go out for a 5k run around Vynnykivskyi Park

7am: Shower and breakfast whilst catching up with some of the football news at home and around Europe

7:30am: Into the office and begin to sift the emails that I hadn’t managed to get through the previous day. These were largely from the Leonid, Artem and Danny with various assessments of players and upcoming opposition, and a small handful from local agents and intermediaries claiming to represent players that they considered might do a job for us – basically touting their clients in order to line their own palms with silver.

9am: Across to the ground and the physio room to get a fitness update on the crocks. Borys had been responding well to treatment, better than expected, and although the following day’s game would be too soon for him, he would be able to return to full training on Monday and might be available for the bench the following midweek’s visit to Kremin.

Vladyslav Bugay’s left ankle was still quite swollen and he was undergoing treatment to bring that down before being able to properly assess the damage. At this point, we still weren’t sure how long he was going to be out for – it could be a week, it could be two or three months.

The X-Ray on Eugene Lozovyi’s ribs had come back and shown hairline fractures on two of them and he was now under specialist care at the local private hospital courtesy of an insurance scheme I’d previously been unaware of but that Grygoriy Kozlovskyi had in place. With complete rest, he was looking at about 3 weeks out, potentially longer if he exacerbated the injury.

After taking the time to speak in depth with Vasyl about these three plus the odd twinge here and there amongst the rest of the squad that might need managing, I popped my head in to see Vladyslav and Borys, both of whom were undergoing treatment before training, and saying hello. Borys would be undergoing some light running during the session with Eugene Barzaka as he began his rehabilitation on the training pitch.

10am: A meeting with the players to go through our tactical approach for the Gelios game. Although our general shape would be unchanged, this was a chance for Olexandr Drachenko, Danny and myself to go through one or two little areas to be aware of in terms of where the opposition could cause us problems as well and chinks in their armour as well. Danny’s Power-Point presentations were so concise, to the point and most importantly, highly illuminating, that they matched anything I’d seen in England at a higher level. We worked hard to keep the meetings no longer than half-an-hour and also to engage the players through setting them one or two little problems to try and come up with solutions for themselves to keep boredom to a minimum.

10:30am: The boys got changed whilst Olexandr, Eugene, Sergiy, Vsevlod and I finalised our plans for the session. A 10-minute warm up followed by 4 x 3-minute keep-ball drills with the goalkeepers separated off for some intensive drills with Vsevlod. After that, half-an-hour working on set-piece drills with 15-minutes focused on setting up defensively based on what we knew about Gelios and then 15-minutes on our attacking ones trying to come up with something a little different.  A 5-minute break to take on fluids and allow the lads a pit-stop, if they needed, and then back into it.

Half-an-hour of small sided games – 3 x 10-minute matches on two pitches with four teams of five-a-side in a round-robin tournament – myself and Olexandr making up the shortfall in numbers due to injuries. It was still a real pleasure slipping the ball through the legs of a lumbering centre-half from time to time and leaving them squarely on their rump, yet every time I did that, I was often greeted with a rather meaty challenge moments later.

To finish off, the defenders would head off with Sergiy to work on a little bit of shape work whilst the midfielders and strikers broke up into two groups and worked on finishing. This was always a lot of fun, the goalkeepers flinging themselves every which way and other whilst the attacking players worked hard to beat them in the most spectacular possible manner. Come the end of the session, everyone was puffing from a good work out and looking forward to match-day.

1pm: Lunch-time. Grygoriy had managed to get a local deli to provide us with lunch on training days in a function room behind their main area. Not only did this ensure that the boys got the right kind of food inside them, but also helped with team building and morale, giving them a real chance to get to know each-other outside of the dressing room. This was a key part in fostering a strong team spirit and something that had worked well in my playing days. Sometimes, I would mix-up who sat with whom to try and get read of any festering cliques.

2:30pm: Whilst the boys headed home to rest up ahead of the following day, it was back to the office for me to finish trawling through my Inbox and update the player shortlist that I was beginning to compile. Over time, this would become quite an intricate web of Excel spreadsheets, hyperlinks to pdf files and YouTube clips as well as a database of stats as I increased my knowledge of players who may, or may not, help us in the short – or medium-term future. Again, experience had taught me the value of a smart and efficient scouting system in being able to sniff out a bargain – Leicester City’s acquisitions of Riyadh Mahrez and N’golo Kante to form the spine of their title winning side a couple of years earlier vs QPR signing the likes of Chris Bamba on £100k per week and Rio Ferdinand, amongst others, who was only fit at that point for the knacker’s yard. I knew it would have to be a slow burner and would be unlikely to produce immediate overnight results, but it was absolutely essential as far as I was concerned.

4pm: Stroll across to the stadium to have a wander on the pitch and check out the playing surface. The groundsman, Oleg Stepanenko, was slowly pushing his way around the pitch with the line painter and as he came past me on the halfway line he stopped and came over.

‘Is okay?’ he asked pointing at the grass.

‘It’s excellent.’ I replied, giving him the thumbs up. He responded with a toothless grin which radiated pride and on he went with his job.

The pitch wasn’t 100% level, it undulated slightly from side to side but that was to be expected at this level. The main thing was that there was a good even covering of grass, it wasn’t patchy, and that the surface was nicely manicured. Not too long, a nice short grain, meaning that the ball ran nicely along the surface without bobbling round too much.

4:30pm: Dropped in on Grygoriy on the way back to the hotel for a cup of tea and chat about how things had gone during the week – the cup match, injuries and prospects for the following day.

‘We’re quietly confident,’ I told him. ‘The boys looked sharp in training this morning, we have a chance of getting something.’

‘That is good,’ he said. ‘I look forward the game, I am sorry I missed the cup win.’

5:15pm: An email came through as I was packing my match-day bag ready for the following day with the 1st round cup draw. We would travel to Ingulets-Petrove, a side in the same division as us but currently struggling in the bottom four. I forwarded the email on to Grygoriy and got a one-word reply from him:

‘Winnable’

That it was, and the game would take place three days before we were due to travel there in the league. Checking where Petrove was, I found it was a fair old drive to the East and a fairly large undertaking to make the journey twice in the space of three days. I sent Grygoriy an response outlining this and seeing if we could discuss ways of mitigating travel fatigue nearer the time. To that I received no reply.

6:30pm: Down to the hotel bar for a bite to eat, some soup and a bit of pasta with some tomato pesto along with a beer. On the TV was the Ukrainian news channel that, from what I understood, was talking about the presidential elections which were due to take place in less than two-years.

7:30pm: Getting ready to go and meet Vasyl Makarov and his merry band of Rukh supporters I decided to wear jeans, tan coloured brogues, a shirt and jacket before giving the beard a mini taming. A splash of cologne and I was ready to go. I’d looked up where the bar was, it was no more than a 10-minute walk, so I figured if I was able to get there for quarter to eight I’d be back in the room and get ready for bed by 9.

11:45pm: Finally got into bed following a rather longer night than I’d intended. Despite my best efforts to ward off the flow of beer and vodka, Vasyl and co were very difficult people to say no to. The welcome was extremely warm, there were handshakes and bear-hugs a-plenty from the dozen or so fans whose names I asked for more than once and then forgot more than once.

At one point in the evening Yulya from Marina’s company walked in with her man and our eyes met. I beckoned her over to introduce her to the group as ‘the lady who unearthed our backroom team’. She was warmly welcomed too and somehow, found the wherewithal to decline the myriad offers of drinks. She did, however, introduce me to her husband, Artur, and we shook hands warmly. His English was as good as his wife’s and I offered them an open invitation to come and take in a game any time they wished.

‘Just give me a call and let me know, you’d be more than welcome as my guests. Access all areas!’ I promised, not that tis would provide them with an awful lot more than they’d get paying across the turnstile, but the thought was there.

They thanked me for the offer – ‘It depends on whether you clash with Karpaty’ Artur had stated, chuckling - and I wished them a happy evening before returning to our table to be schooled in one or two of the local songs.

Once I’d finally managed to extricate myself from the festivities – which were still in full swing - at half-past 11, I was very much more uneasy on my feet than I had intended to be. But, I’d come away having made some friends. ‘Even if team lose, you welcome with us,’ Vasyl had said as I said my goodbyes, sweeping me into a hug with that enormous wing-span of his. Somehow, I found my way back to my hotel, and room, laying down on the bed bringing with it blessed relief. Setting my alarm for 6am to start another day, I switched out the light and tried to sleep, thoughts of strategies, substitutions and permutations fizzing through my mind until the fog of alcohol finally overtook me and allowed me to drift off to sleep some time later.

Link to post
Share on other sites

10.       Ukrainian First League: Rukh Vynnyky v Gelios (12th August 2017)

 

I awoke late and with a very puffy head. It took me a little while to recognise what had happened the night before and work out quite where I was but after checking my phone and the time a couple of times, things became rather clearer and my mild panic subsided.

It was the first weekend home game of the season some five weeks after the campaign had begun. I was looking forward to playing hosts on a Saturday afternoon and seeing if the earlier kick-off would bring with it a bigger crowd. In actual fact, perversely given our form and the earlier kick off, we ended up with our lowest gate of the season – 307 beating our previous low of 309 which we’d got against Odesa. That was a problem for solution another time.

Gelios were the visitors, a side that were coming into the game in 6th place having lost just one of their first 8 matches and unbeaten in four. However, their previous three matches had been drawn and only 9 goals had been scored in total in their games so far. A romping nine-goal thriller looked rather against the odds.

Formed in 2002, the club was intriguingly named after Helios – the Greek God of the Sun – and based in Kharkiv, a city on the eastern border of Ukraine. It was difficult to get much further east without crossing the border into Russia.


They’d competed in the First League since 2005 and after eight or nine seasons of floating around in the bottom half of the table, they’d gone on to enjoy three years of top-half finishes including, last time out, an impressive fourth placed finish – albeit 9 points outside the promotion play-off places. With another solid start under their belts, this was likely to be a stern test of our credentials, whatever they were.

It was largely back to as you were in terms of team selection with Dyachenko, Ivan Bilyi, Grysyo, Tkachuk and Khomchenko returning to the starting line-up. The injury to Vladyslav Bugay had meant a stay of execution for the centre-forward even through my new signing had hardly shown himself to be any more clinical against Energiya, he had shown a bit more about him in term of his all-round game and awareness as far as I was concerned. This gave Khomchenko a chance to change my mind, it was all down to him now to take it.

Olexandr Dyachenko

Andriy Markovych           Ivan Bilyi             Igor Duts              Mykhaylo Pysko

Yuriy Tkachuk ©              Grygoriy Baranets

Maxym Grysyo                                                                                 Volodymyr Bidlovskyi

Svyatoslav Zubar              Victor Khomchenko

In my pre-match remarks I kept emphasising the need to take our chances. ‘They are a strong side, they will not give much away and when a chance comes, you have to take it. If you don’t, we may pay the price.’ The boys were looking motivated, they seemed focused and ready to go. Not quite itching to do so, but certainly tapping at the door.

The visitors, in their Norwich City-esq away kit of yellow and green started snappily, pressing us quickly and biting away in the tackle when we had possession. From a Grysyo cross early on to the near post, Svyatoslav Zubar’s first touch was good, but the defending was so on point that he didn’t have a chance to take a second. Sergiy Loboyko flew in with a superb challenge on the edge of the 6-yard box taking the ball cleanly and leaving our top-scorer crumpled and in pain. It was his ankle and by the time Vasyl had got on to treat him, it was already beginning to balloon. I had no choice but to get his namesake, Kozlovskyi readied and into the action with no more than 6 minutes gone. A frustrating start to the game.

In the 10th minute, Igor Duts won the ball mid-way inside his own half and found Grygoriy Baranets in a few yards of space. The playmaker trotted forward and then sent a lovely pass through, bisecting two of the three visiting centre-halves for Khomchenko to dart onto. With only the goalkeeper to beat he opened his body and tried to slide it with the inside of his right foot into the far corner, but Denys Sydorenko had read his intention and made a good save. Kozlovskyi galloped onto the loose ball and cut it back from an acute angle but behind Khomchenko and too far in-front of Bidlovskyi to allow either player to get onto cross.

A free-kick from the left flank five minutes later was delivered beautifully into an area that was too far out for Sydorenko to come out and claim, yet in behind the Gelios defenders. Duts was able to see the ball all the way and leapt highest, getting a powerful head onto the ball but sending it just over the top of the bar with Sydorenko beaten.

Within a minute, Duts once again won the ball in his own half and found Baranets. This time the midfielder went right and found Grysyo. With both wide players consistently getting in behind the opposing wing-backs, there was plenty of fun to be had and indeed his deep cross towards the far post found Bidlovskyi on the run who met the ball on the fall from just outside the 6-yard box. He was just unable to control his effort though and the ball flew back off the face of the post, almost taking his head off as it flew past him again into the path of Vadym Schastlyvtsev who was able to bring the ball clear for the visiting side.

With the half approaching its midway point, Illya Glushytskyi received the ball from a throw-in and drove forward, seeing the run of Anton Kicha, he threaded a lovely ball into his path. Kicha, shrugged off the challenge of Ivan Bilyi and got into the penalty area where he shot, low and left footed. The ball was headed into the far corner but luckily for us, Dyachenko got down well to push the ball behind for a corner and preserve parity.

‘Switch on!’ I shouted from the technical area. ‘Stronger, Ivan!’ The centre half waved in acknowledgement as he lined up to face the set-piece which passed without incident, Bilyi himself atoning for his weak challenge by strongly heading Igor Koshman’s cross away from danger.

With ten minutes of the half remaining, a free kick in a dangerous area for Gelios saw Glushytskyi’s delivery won in the air by Andriy Markovych and Khomchenko picked up the loose ball midway inside our own half. He carried the ball 70 or 80 yards, down the right flank towards the by-line before showing the presence of mind to cut the ball back to Baranets inside the penalty area. The midfielder let fly with a strike which was charged down by Schaslyvtsev but it broke nicely for Tkachuk just inside the D. Rather than shooting, he cutely shifted the ball to the left for Bidlovskyi to fire an angled shot at goal. Sydorenko plunged to his left to make a superb save, but the left-winger had followed up his own effort and driven a low cross across the 6-yard box where it was met at pace by Grysyo who fairly leathered it first time high into the roof of the net to give us a deserved lead. It had been a stunning counter-attack and left the Gelios defenders looking at each-other in despair as if to ask where on earth that Exocet had come from.

For Maxym Grysyo, it was a third goal in consecutive starts and again, showed the value of having the wingers attacking the far-post as much as possible. It was a potential goldmine of goals.

That was the advantage that we took into the break and I spent a couple of minutes going around the room and encouraging. We’d done well, by and large, again, as with the cup game in midweek I just wanted that second goal. I really couldn’t see how the opposition were going to score twice, they just didn’t have any kind of fire-power in the final third. A second goal could very well put the game to bed and provide us with the points.

The opening 25-minutes of the half were poor with neither side creating anything more than half-chances from distance that either provided the goalkeeper with fielding practice on the boundary, or not troubling the target at all.

In the 72nd minute, a neatly worked free-kick routine caught us out as Kicha fed a low pass into the penalty area after receiving a free-kick from the left in all sorts of space. I was apoplectic on the touchline since we’d been looking at that the previous day in training and as Igor Lutsenko’s low shot was well smothered by the diving Dyachenko, I was once again on the edge of my technical area berating the boys for switching off.

Immediately I took of Yuriy Tkachuk, who had been detailed to be aware of that move and replaced him with Nazar Verbnyi. There was no way that the replacement would forget his duties in a hurry such was the force of my little tantrum.

Within a minute of the change, Bidlovskyi and Baranets had exchanged passes down the left flank and the latter put in yet another wonderful cross. It fell for Kozlovskyi, in space, and rather than take a chance, the substitute elected to volley first time and go for the spectacular. The ball was fiercely struck alright, but it was awry in terms of aim and although Sydorenko was at full stretch, it comfortably missed the angle of post and bar and ended up behind the goal.

With fifteen minutes remaining, Bidlovskyi, who had been quite superb throughout the afternoon, intercepted a pass and played the ball inside for Khomchenko. The striker’s ball inside the left-sided centre half for Kozlovskyi was an absolute picture and sent him scampering down the right edge of the six-yard box. With the angle against him, he cut the ball back onto the head of the onrushing Khomchenko but, unable to direct his header as he (or indeed I) might have wished, it was straight at Sydorenko who made a comfortable stop.

Once again, the game should have been put to bed long before this point, however we were beginning to live ever more nervously without that extra cushion of a second goal.

A warning was sounded with ten minutes left when a swift break after Pysko was caught in possession saw Kicha shift the ball left for the half-time substitute Igor Semenyna to get onto. He ran 15 yards before unleashing a powerful left-footed shot which thankfully, ended a couple of yards wide of Dyachenko’s right-hand post and in the advertising hoardings.

With the game entering stoppage time, Kicha flicked a near-post header from a corner straight into the waiting gloves of Dyachenko who was perfectly positioned. Then, at the other end, a lovely cross by Grysyo was wastefully headed over the top from inside the 6-yard box by Khomchenko. That was the final action of the afternoon and although we’d won and had by far and away the better of the game, our wastefulness in-front of goal had very nearly come back to bite us on the behind. A severe improvement was required in front of goal, particularly in view of the likely absence of Zubar for a while with his ankle knock. At some point soon, that profligacy was going to prove our undoing. That was a conundrum for me to mull over during the remainder of the weekend.

There was some more positive news awaiting us as we traipsed back into the dressing room, the boys slightly muted for knowing that they should have put the game to bed. Desna had won the clash of the top two, comfortably, beating Obolon-Brewer 3-0. That result, coupled with our own victory had seen us leapfrog Obolon and jump to 2nd spot in the table with a shade over a quarter of the season gone.

Very pleasing stuff.

Rukh Vynnyky 1-0 Gelios

Team: Dyachenko, Markovych, I.Bilyi, Duts, Pysko, G.Baranets, Tkachuk (Verbnyi), Grysyo  Bidlovskyi, Zubar (Kozlovskyi), Khomchenko

Subs not used: Illyuscehenkov, Kopyna, Panasyuk, V.Bilyi, Chepelyuk

Shots: 28 - 5

Shots On Target: 14 - 4

Possession: 54% - 46%

Link to post
Share on other sites

Saturday 12th August 2017 – Results and Table

Avangard Kramatorsk

4-0

Cherkaskyi Dnipro

Desna

3-0

Obolon-Brewer

Ingluets-Petrove

0-1

Girnyk-Sport

Kolos Kovalivka

1-0

Mykolaiv

Naftovyk-Ukmafta

1-1

Balkany Zorya

Rukh Vynnyky

1-0

Gelios

Sumy

1-1

Kremin

Volyn

0-1

Arsenal-Kyiv

Zhemchuzhyna Odesa

1-0

Poltava

 

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Desna

9

7

1

1

18

7

22

11

Rukh Vynnyky

9

7

0

2

14

6

21

8

Obolon-Brewer

9

6

2

1

10

5

20

5

Kolos Kovalivka

9

5

3

1

16

9

18

7

Volyn

9

5

1

3

12

6

16

6

Naftovyk-Ukmafta

9

3

4

2

10

8

13

2

Gelios

9

3

4

2

6

4

13

2

Arsenal-Kyiv

9

3

4

2

10

9

13

1

Balkany Zorya

9

3

3

3

10

10

12

0

Zhemchuzhyna Odesa

9

3

3

3

8

8

12

0

Girnyk-Sport

9

3

2

4

10

10

11

0

Poltava

9

3

2

4

11

14

11

-3

Avangard Kramatorsk

9

3

1

5

12

12

10

0

Kremin

9

3

1

5

16

21

10

-5

Sumy

9

2

3

4

10

16

9

-6

Ingulets Petrove

9

1

2

6

4

11

5

-7

Mykolaiv

9

0

4

5

2

10

4

-8

Cherkaskyi Dnipro

9

1

0

8

5

19

3

-14

Link to post
Share on other sites

11.       Ukrainian First League: Kremin v Rukh Vynnyky (16th August 2017)

The prognosis on Svyatoslav Zubar wasn’t good. He had done his ankle ligaments and was looking at a minimyum of four-weeks out. With Vladyslav Bugay also ruled out for the foreseeable, it left me with two barely serviceable centre-forwards for the next couple of weeks. With four matches scheduled in that period, I felt it was crucial for us to get in a bit of extra cover. I gathered together Danny, Leonid and Artem in the office on the Monday morning to outline my issues.

‘Okay then boys, this is the situation,’ I began. ‘Svyatoslav is out for the best part of a month and Vladyslav for a fortnight, in that time we have four absolutely vital games before the international break which gives us a little breathing space. Now, you know as well as I do that Victor and the president’s son aren’t good enough at this level – willing workers, but a total lack of killer instinct in front of goal. Now, I will be speaking to the president later on today about trying to get someone in, see if there’s anything we can do wage-wise so your task is to find strikers who we might be able to get in for no cost, or for very little money. Any ideas?’

Artem looked completely blank and Danny deep in thought. Leonid was the first to pipe up, through Danny’s useful translation. ‘Well, I have one or two ideas.’ He said. ‘The first one is to look at guys out of the local amateur leagues who we could offer a deal to on a short-term basis and see how they get on. That’s low-risk, low-cost but a gamble as there’s no guarantee that they’ll be able to manage the step up.’

‘Okay, I said. ‘That’s something we could look at. What else do you have in mind?’

‘Speak to some of the big clubs in the Highest League to see if they have anyone suitable in their Under 21 squads who might be interested in a loan-move. Often, they’ll be happy to let guys go out on loan and cover their wages since it’s beneficial to them to have the boys playing first team football and getting some experience rather than the tepid stuff they play in the Under-21s.’ This was an approach that interested me, certainly more so than the other idea he’d come up with.

‘Okay, do you have any specific players in mind?’ I asked.

‘Well, I know of one or two at Karpaty who might be available, but my knowledge of those at Dynamo, Shakhtar, Dnipro and Metalurst – they’re the other clubs I’d be looking at – isn’t so good at the moment. But, we can ask around?’ Leonid replied.

I took a moment to mull things over. ‘How long do you think it would take for you to get some names?’

‘By tomorrow lunchtime, I would expect.’

Another moment thought.

‘Okay. Could you make a list of names both of guys at Highest League clubs and another of anyone you know of in the local game please? Let me have them by lunchtime tomorrow so that I can spend the afternoon on the phone. Leonid, can you lead on this please?’

The old man nodded his wisened grey bespectacled dome.

After they left I picked up the phone and rang Grygoriy.

‘Paul!’ The president exclaimed with such volume, that I was forced to move the phone away from my ear. ‘How are you? What I can do for you?’

‘I’m well thanks, Grygoriy. I wanted to run something past you if that’s okay?’

‘Of course, of course, what you have?’

I had to treat this a little delicately since I was effectively stating that I believed his son wasn’t good enough to lead the line in the absence of two of my three front-line strikers – and two of those I still had question marks over. ‘Well, we have heard this morning that Zubar will be out for at least four weeks,’ I stated. ‘That with Vladyslav also out until the international break leaves us very short up front. Another injury and we’re stumped.’

‘Stumped?’

‘Sorry, that’s a cricketing term. We’re shafted.’

‘Ah, yes. Okay.’

I explained the plan of attack that I’d agreed with the scouting team and asked Grygoriy for his thoughts. There was a moment of silence whilst the president weighed up his words.

‘Well, I see the need for new striker of course.’ I could sense a but coming and sure enough, ‘but money, we lose nearly 2 million hryvnia in July, I cannot afford new wages. Cannot one other player be striker if need be?’

A quick calculation in my head worked out that it was in excess of £50k lost in July alone. Extend that over a 12-month period and the losses were eye-watering. Worse than I thought.

‘I suppose we could try that,’ I said uncertainly, not really a fan of putting square pegs in round holes at all. ‘But, if we can find someone from one of the top-flight clubs on loan at no extra cost to us, would you be okay with that?’

‘See what you find and we talk more.’ He said. ‘In principle, maybe.’

I thanked him and hung up, eyes opened as to the scale of the financial duress the club was under. Although I’d seen figures when I took the job, they weren’t as bad as what I’d just been told. Before leaving the office to head across for training, I gave Danny a quick call and asked him to see if Leonid could prioritise the nil-cost option ahead of the local talent.

***

We made the journey to Kremenchuk, which is west of Poltava but on the eastern bank of the Dnieper, leaving early on the Wednesday morning and checking into a local hotel for lunch, and then to allow the boys to get a couple of hours sleep before the evening kick-off. This, being our first midweek road-trip was far from ideal preparation, but it was what it was and we had to make the best of it.

I didn’t sleep, instead working hard on deals to bring a couple of new faces in on-loan from the top flight. One was a centre-forward, the other a full-back who was able to play on either flank. It occurred to me that we were a little short there as well and after getting the okay from Grygoriy to pursue the centre forward target, I sneakily added in the full-back as well. Both deals looked fairly positive, but they were a little way from completion. With luck, I’d have one, possibly both new boys available for the weekend visit of Mykolaiv.

Kremin went into the game precariously balanced just outside the bottom four with 10 points from their opening 9 matches. After coming off the game against Gelios, who had been involved in a host of low-scoring games so far, Kremin’s 9 matches had seen 37 goals scored. Although good going forward, they were a little bit porous defensively going at more than two goals per game conceded. This was something that had been emphasised in the pre-match briefings, that in every game they’d played they had conceded a host of chances so there was a real need to show a far more clinical edge in front of goal than we had in our previous two matches. Failure to do so would, I warned, see them punish us.

Formed under their current guise in 2003, Kremin’s roots went back to the 1959 when they had been formed as FC Dnipro Kremenchuk and were dissolved in 1970 following 6 seasons competing in the Soviet lower leagues. 15-years later, the Soviet lorry manufacturer KrAZ set up a new team in Kremenchuk, and they competed in the top-flight of the Ukrainian league post-independence before themselves being dissolved in 2001.

Two years later, the city council decided to form a club financed from a local budget and they gained promotion the pervious season after finishing 3rd in the third tier. This, then, was their first season at this level and although they’d gained three wins so far, they were still finding things a little bit of a struggle.

Their recent story was tinged with tragedy. On July 26th 2014, their president Oleg Babaiev – also at that point the mayor of Kremenchuk – was shot dead. The story goes that he was murdered in his car in front of his house when an unidentified gun-man fired three shots from another car with a silenced weapon. More than 50,000 people attended his funeral, including the mayor of Kyiv and former World Heavyweight Champion Vitaly Klitchko, as the city went into mourning. At the time of our arrival at the FC Kremin Stadium, the post of president was still unfilled.

The side contained just the single enforced change with Svyatoslav Kozlovskyi replacing Zubar, but on the more positive side, Borys Baranets was fit enough to take his place amongst the substitutes.

’90 minutes will be risky,’ Vasyl had told me, ‘but 30 minutes, maybe 45 should be fine.’

That was good enough for me and so, sooner than I had expected, I was able to name him in the match-day squad. The hope was that he’d be fit enough to start at the weekend.

Olexandr Dyachenko

Andriy Markovych           Ivan Bilyi             Igor Duts              Mykhaylo Pysko

Yuriy Tkachuk ©              Grygoriy Baranets

Maxym Grysyo                                                                                 Volodymyr Bidlovskyi

Svyatoslav Kozlovskyi    Victor Khomchenko

The opening 10 minutes were quite scrappy with both sides picking up a caution apiece as the tackles flew in and the referee began in a slightly overly officious manner. Finally, things settled down. Grygoriy Baranets took the ball down neatly and sent the ball forward to Khomchenko, the striker knocked the ball on for Kozlovskyi who broke clear. Lacking the half-yard of pace that he needed to go directly for goal, he veered left before cutting the ball across the penalty area where Maxym Grysyo swept the ball home from 10-yards, one of four red shirted attackers who had broken forward at pace. A splendid start to proceedings, the early goal proving extremely welcome.

Once again the game became a little scrappy with neither side able to really stamp their authority on proceedings. The ball was flung forward to-and-fro, tackles breaking up the play and rhythm with increasing regularity.

On 27 minutes, Bidlovskyi won one such tackle inside his own half and knocked the ball back to Mykaylo Pysko in the left-back position. He thumped the ball forward for Khomchenko, who had been played onside by an appallingly applied offside trap to run onto and as the striker entered the penalty area, he had Kozlovskyi totally unmarked to his right with a gaping goal in front of him. Khomchenko, however went himself and after giving the goalkeeper the eyes, neatly swept the ball inside Andriy Oliynyk’s near post to double our advantage. It was a well taken goal for the striker’s second of the season and he deserved credit for the finish.

Three minutes later, a left-wing corner was swung out by Bidlovskyi to Baranets who was hovering 25-yards from goal, completely unmarked. The midfielder took two touches to set himself and then arced a wonderful strike around a couple of players and beyond the unsighted Oliynyk into the left-hand corner of the net. The goalkeeper was grasping at thin-air and Baranets had not only given us what looked like an unassailable half-time lead, but also overtaken his brother in the family goal-scoring competition with his second goal of the campaign. It was a brilliant goal and had everyone off the bench applauding – even his brother who, I think, uttered a profanity under his breath at falling behind in the inter-sibling wager.

With five minutes remaining of the first period, a ball through from Khomchenko saw Kozlovskyi clear yet once again, rather than taking a touch and finishing, he elected to fire in a shot from the edge of the penalty area first time and ended up leathering the ball over the top of the crossbar.

‘For the love of God, why won’t he take a touch?!’ I lamented on the bench, shaking my head and turning to the coaching staff. ‘How many times do we have to tell him?!’

At the break, I congratulated the boys on their efforts. ‘Much better in the final third,’ I told them. ‘Keep up that efficiency in the second period and we can bury this lot. Please though, don’t get complacent, they have some fire-power and if we become lapse, they will punish us.’ The lads looked focused and switched-on, which was pleasing to see. It was nice to have a bit of a cushion underneath us and if I was completely honest, I couldn’t see our opponents getting themselves back in the game through their own efforts. It could only happen if we took our eye off the ball.

Kozlovskyi sent an effort from 25-yards straight at Oliynyk in the opening minute of the second half and then ten minutes later, we were caught completely square at the back as a long ball forward split Ivan Bilyi and Igor Duts sending Igot Tymchenko through on goal. The centre-halves both appealed vainly for offside as Dyachenko narrowed the angle and made a superb block to maintain his clean sheet before pouncing on the rebound.

I made my three changes with us looking comfortable – Verbnyi replacing Baranets, Borys Baranets coming on down the right flank to give Maxym Grysyo a rest and Oleg Panasyuk replacing Yuriy Tkachuk. Two minutes after the third of these changes, Ivan Bilyi went down after coming down heavily on his right ankle coming out of a challenge on the ground. As with Zubar at the weekend, his ankle quickly began to swell and we were forced to play out the final dozen or so minutes with just 10-men.

I moved the two full-backs inside to partner Duts and make a three-man defence, before dropping the two wide men into conventional wide midfield spots and also dropping Victor Khomchenko into midfield leaving Kozlovskyi up front on his own in a 3-5-1 shape. I wasn’t looking forward to the prognosis of Bilyi’s injury with him having formed such a good partnership with Duts – a clean sheet here would secure a sixth on the trot and a 7th overall in just 11 matches.

Hoping we might contain and play out time in the final stages, a cross in from Bidlovskyi saw Borys Baranets go down after a nudge from Andro Giorgadze inside the penalty area. The striker was up on his knees, arms outstretched imploring the referee to give him the penalty kick, the man in black obliged and what looked to me like a fairly innocuous coming together gave us the chance to further extend our lead.

Mykhaylo Pysko, having successfully converted from the spot against Arsenal-Kyiv, again took responsibility. Oliynyk went the right way, but Pysko’s penalty was too strong for him. It nestled neatly in the corner as the full-back peeled away to celebrate and we could bask in the rare beauty of a four-goal lead.

That was that, the hosts were thoroughly beaten and we were able to see time out without scare nor excitement. Fists pumped at the small group of travelling supporters at the final whistle, news filtered down that Arsenal had beaten Desna. The three points had taken us top of the pile!

The dressing room was in a much more exultant mood than it had been at the weekend after the narrow win over Gelios. The performance had been excellent and I couldn’t argue with their efficiency in front of goal either. Our biggest and best win of the season had also seen the best 90-minutes as a unit as well. When I shared the news that we were now top of the league, the cheer was immense. Players were dancing around half naked, throwing kit all over the place and spraying bottles of energy drinks and water everywhere like a rampant donkey. I was happy to let them have their moment of enjoyment and would focus minds again when we reconvened on Friday ahead of our next game at the weekend.

Although the journey home was long, it was very pleasant. The stats were positive. Seven straight wins in all competitions, six consecutive clean sheets. Top of the table and not only was confidence high, the team spirit was building nicely. Before the start of the season, I would have been content with being clear of the bottom four after our first 10 matches, to have shown some signs of progress and laid a base from which we could look to climb the table towards mid-table anonymity. There was still a heck of a long way to go, of course, and this run could well end up being nothing more than a flash in the pan. We still had Desna and Obolon-Brewer to play but so far, there hadn’t been much that had made me feel that they were any better than we were at our best and that whilst I would have to keep people grounded and focused, actually, a tilt at a top-three finish may not be beyond us. Especially if I could get those couple of extra faces in ahead of the weekend. One step at a time, though. Enjoy the moment while I can and go again the following day.

Kremin 0-4 Rukh Vynnyky

Team: Dyachenko, Markovych, I.Bilyi, Duts, Pysko, G.Baranets (Verbnyi), Tkachuk (Panasyuk), Grysyo (B.Barenets),  Bidlovskyi, Kozlovskyi, Khomchenko

Subs not used: Illyuscehenkov, Kopyna, V.Bilyi, Chepelyuk

Shots: 8 - 11

Shots On Target: 5 - 7

Possession: 45% - 55%

Link to post
Share on other sites

Wednesday 16th August 2017 – Results and Table

Arsenal-Kyiv

1-0

Desna

Balkany Zorya

2-2

Kolos Kovalivka

Cherkaskyi Dnipro

3-1

Zhemchuzhyna Odesa

Gelios

2-2

Avangard Kramatorsk

Girnyk-Sport

0-0

Naftovyk-Ukmafta

Kremin

0-4

Rukh Vynnyky

Mykolaiv

1-3

Sumy

Obolon-Brewer

1-0

Ingulets-Petrove

Poltava

0-1

Volyn

 

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Rukh Vynnyky

10

8

0

2

18

6

24

12

Obolon-Brewer

10

7

2

1

11

5

23

6

Desna

10

7

1

2

18

8

22

10

Kolos Kovalivka

10

5

4

1

18

11

19

7

Volyn

10

6

1

3

13

6

19

7

Arsenal-Kyiv

10

4

4

2

11

9

16

2

Naftovyk-Ukmafta

10

3

5

2

10

8

14

2

Gelios

10

3

5

2

8

6

14

2

Balkany Zorya

10

3

4

3

12

12

13

0

Girnyk-Sport

10

3

3

4

10

10

12

0

Zhemchuzhyna Odesa

10

3

3

4

9

11

12

-2

Sumy

10

3

3

4

13

17

12

-4

Avangard Kramatorsk

10

3

2

5

14

14

11

0

Poltava

10

3

2

5

11

15

11

-4

Kremin

10

3

1

6

16

25

10

-9

Cherkaskyi Dnipro

10

2

0

8

8

20

6

-12

Ingulets Petrove

10

1

2

7

4

12

5

-8

Mykolaiv

10

0

4

6

3

13

4

-10

Link to post
Share on other sites

12.       Ukrainian First League: Rukh Vynnyky v Mykolaiv (19th August 2017)

The three days between the romp in Kremenchuk and the home game with bottom markers Mykolaiv brought with it news of varying degrees of pleasure. Frustratingly, Ivan Bilyi’s ankle injury was a near carbon-copy of Svyatoslav Zubar’s and he was out for at least 4 weeks, possibly longer. I had been loathed to break-up the central defensive partnership he’d built with Igor Duts, they had been by and large unbreachable in the previous three weeks or so, however necessity dictated the need to bring in a deputy. It was at this point that I was quite pleased that I’d had the foresight to give Olexandr Chepelyuk some minutes in the cup ten days before the Mykolaiv fixture so he wouldn’t be coming into the team completely cold.

On a more positive note, I had been able to welcome one new face to the squad the day after the victory against Kremin – 20-year old striker Oleg Glagola had signed on-loan for the remainder of the season from Shakhtar Donetsk and was available for selection immediately whilst, in the stands would be a second new face, yet to put pen to paper but also someone I hoped to have finalised by the end of the weekend and available for the midweek visit to Zorya when we were to meet Balkany.

The player concerned was a full-back, able to play on either side and also at Shakhtar – his name had come up in conversation with their manager, Paulo Fonseca when getting the Glagola deal negotiated. A 19-year old, Paulo said that he had only recently joined the Ukrainian champions and that even if I could only offer him minutes here and there to introduce him to the rigours of professional football, that would be of huge benefit to the player, and Shakhtar. I readily accepted and had him sat with Grygoriy in the stand so that he could get a feel of the club, the place and the team before making his final decision.

‘Turn on the charm,’ I told the president the morning of the game. ‘We could really do with him in the ranks.’

‘Paul, do not worry. Grygoriy is, how you say, host with most, yes?’ The owner chuckled heartily and thumped me familiarly on the back. ‘We get this deal done, is all okay.’

I didn’t doubt the president’s words, but from what I knew of the young lad, he was quite a shy kid and would need a little bit of gentle coaxing out of his shell. I could relate to that, I had been much the same at his age and had found myself easily overawed in a dressing room full of egos and big personalities.

Coming into new and unfamiliar surroundings was difficult at the best of times even for the most seasoned of professionals. One where confidence was high and personalities were at their most boisterous could prove enormously intimidating and although Oleg seemed to be reasonably gregarious and had been readily accepted by his peers, I was a little concerned as to how his Shakhtar team-mate might react. I was giving some steady thought to asking one of the older boys, one of the lads who was well respected and held a bit of sway over his colleagues to take him under his wing if we were able to complete the deal – that could all be ironed out the following week, though.

First up, the focus was on welcoming winless Mykolaiv to the Bogdan Markevych and making sure that the boys approached the game as professionally as they had the midweek game with Kremin. I knew from experience how easy it could be to go into a game against a side that was struggling and think you only needed to be at 90-95% to win. Sometimes that might indeed be enough, oftentimes when that was the case you would come unstuck. I kept emphasising the need to be on it from the first whistle, to press them high and press them fast, win back possession and transition quickly. If, as I hoped, we went at them early on, I couldn’t see any way that they would be able to live with us.

There were three changes to the starting, two enforced the other through choice. As mentioned, Chepelyuk came in for Bilyi and Nazar Verbnyi replaced Yuriy Tkachuk who had tweaked his knee in training the previous day. He wasn’t worth risking. Up front, Oleg Glagola came in for his professional debut with Svyatoslav Kozlovskyi dropping to the bench. Borys Baranets was still not quite ready for a full 90, so with Volodymyr Bidlovskyi continuing to impress down the left-flank, I was comfortable with leaving the experienced winger on the bench for this one with a view to giving him some more minutes at some point in the afternoon.

Olexandr Dyachenko

Andriy Markovych           Olexandr Chepelyuk      Igor Duts ©        Mykhaylo Pysko

Nazar Verbnyi                   Grygoriy Baranets

Maxym Grysyo                                                                                 Volodymyr Bidlovskyi

Oleg Glagola      Victor Khomchenko

I’d hoped that we might have been able to take advantage of some uncertainty and a lack of confidence in the visitors by getting at them early on and trying to put them on the rack and under pressure sooner rather than later.

The game was just over 5 minutes old when Grygoriy Baranets made an interception from an Igor Sikorskyi header that was intended for Sergiy Prykhod’ko and spread the ball right into the path of Maxym Grysyo who had space to drive into. As he crossed the halfway line, he noticed the run of Glagola down the right flank 20-yards in front of him and played the ball down the line for the debutant to run onto. His ball in was looking for Khomchenko, but Kostantyn Chaus was there to make a superb block tackle and expertly bring the ball clear. He eventually sent it forward down the Mykolaiv right but was only able to find Mykhaylo Pysko on the halfway line. A lofted pass towards the edge of the penalty area found Glagola who took a touch to control and then with his second, played in the overlapping Grysyo who checked his stride, waited for the ball to arrive and then struck a low right-footed drive that beat Yaroslav Vazhynskyi at his near post and rippled the net in superb style.

It was a fifth goal of the season for the right-winger, taking him level with Zubar and he was absolutely cock-a-hoop with delight, dancing away at the corner flag. Just the start we’d been looking for.

Only 6 minutes later, Chepelyuk stood up well to block a cross and then come away with the ball in the right-back area level with the edge of his own penalty area. A little pass forward for Grysyo was then returned to Markovych who once again found Grysyo, dropping deep to collect the ball. Grysyo went inside to Baranets and he shifted it infield to Verbnyi, about eight yards inside halfway. The midfielder stroked it back out to the right for Grysyo and the ball was then shifted back for Verbnyi now four or five yards inside the Mykolaiv half. It was patient stuff, thoughtful but progressive and Verbnyi strode forward a dozen or so yards before sweeping the ball left for Bidlovskyi, who had space down the left flank. From deep he sent an early cross in which beat the two visiting centre-halves and fell perfectly for Glagola, eight yards from goal, to stroke the ball right-footed beyond the hopelessly exposed Vazhynskyi and into the net. What a way to mark not only your club debut, but your first ever senior appearance! Goal Goal Goal! Expertly taken.

A dozen minutes on the clock and 2-0 up. The crowd, which was noticeably bigger than usual largely due to a bigger than usual away following, were roaring the boys forward, doing my job for me. I was able to patrol the technical area pensively stroking my chin and enjoying the early show.

Ten minutes later and as another Mykolaiv sortie floundered, a ball over the top this time from Pysko sent Khomchenko clear. Into the penalty area he strode and from a not too dissimilar position from that which he had scored in midweek, this time he showed a total lack of assuredness and fired straight at Vazhynskyi who, although he would have been disappointed had he conceded, still made a good stop to keep his side on life support.

The reprieve was short-lived for two minutes later, a routine back-pass to Vazhynskyi from Sergiy Alexksanov hit the goal-keeper’s standing foot as he went to clear and scuffed off his boot, rebounding off first the post, then the keeper’s midriff before falling for Grysyo, who had been sniffing around on the off-chance, and barely able to believe his luck, he fairly lashed the ball home from a range of no-more than a yard into the roof of the net. 3-0 in the most absurd of circumstances and a goal which you get when things are running your way whereas when you’re struggling, lo-and-behold everything goes against you. The poor goalkeeper had his head in his hands for what felt like an age, barely able to credit what had just occurred.

In the 27th minute, as if to sum up the visitor’s ill-fortune, a very well worked free-kick routine ended with Roman Popov playing the ball in for Artem Bessalov to sweep home a fine right footed drive on the angle across Dyachenko and into the far bottom corner. Myoklaiv celebrated, thinking they had found a way back into the game but, alas, an assistant’s flag had ruled the strike illegal, a most marginal decision going against the strugglers.

It was no surprise therefore, that when Chepelyuk went down from a shove by Aleksanov as he tried to get on the end of a Bidlovskyi corner kick, the referee immediately pointed to the penalty spot. Pysko stepped up and found the same corner that he had in midweek with absolute aplomb, leaving Vazhynskyi totally wrong footed and upright in the centre of his goal, only able to watch as the ball beat him to make it 4-0.

It had been an impressive opening 45-minutes where once again, we’d shown a real clinical edge. We’d been helped on our way by some injudicious defending and one or two borderline decisions going our way and it was difficult not to feel some sympathy for the visiting players as they came off at the break, heads bowed to a man and looking utterly dejected. Not that that stopped me from urging the players to continue pushing on in the second half in pursuit of more goals.

Something didn’t click though. The second half performance was awful. From the moment that Popov had forced a smart save from Dyachenko after being left completely unmarked from a Vadym Yarvorksyi free-kick 8 minutes after the restart, we were slovenly and lethargic in almost everything we did. It was a display that reeked of complacency and I was seething on the touchline.

It was no surprise therefore, when with the half approaching its midway point, a patient move that saw us fail to engage the man in possession at all was ended with Stanislav Chuchman’s excellent through ball being finished superbly by Yavorskyi as he found himself with only Dyachenko to beat. This was the first time the goalkeeper had been beaten since Taras Lazarovych had headed past him in the first-half for Odesa some three and a half weeks previously. Of course, all records must come to an end, but this was a particularly disappointing way for this one to end. I was heartened to see Dyachenko berating those in front of him after the concession – one of the boys was at least giving it everything after the break.

I had hoped that the goal would awaken us from our slumber, alas not. Three minutes later a Bessarov ball once again split Chepelyuk and Duts leaving Yarvorskyi through on goal again, this time his effort was errant and radar awry, pulling his effort wide of the far post. I was on my feet, barking like a husky and cajoling like a street performer.

Still we were sleepwalking and with twelve minutes remaining another slick Myoklaiv move saw Chuchman combine with Sikorskyi and play Yavorskyi in once again. This time the effort was on target and it required a superb strong left arm from Dyachenko as he dived to his right to get enough onto the ball to flick it up and off the face of the crossbar. The danger wasn’t clear and after half a dozen further chances another Sikorskyi ball into Yavorskyi saw the Myoklaiv goalscorer beat Duts with the neatest of little touches and look to slip the ball beyond Dyachenko. This time the goalkeeper dived to his left and managed to push the ball onto the post before Pysko finally tidied up once and for all.

I was absolutely fuming on the touchline, quietly simmering with disbelief and anger. I didn’t care that we were 4-1 up, I didn’t care that our first half performance had been so impressive. What I’d seen after the break was completely unacceptable. It hadn’t escaped my notice that were it not for Dyachenko, there is every chance that we’d have squandered a four-goal advantage.

Even with the visitors down to 10-men following a late injury sustained by Dmytro Nazarenko, there was another ball over the top, this time from Olexandr Izmalkov that saw Yavorkskyi clear again. Once again Dyachenko met the challenge head on and produce yet another superb save, pushing the ball wide.

At the whistle, I commiserated with my opposite number, Ruslan Zabranskyi and told him that on that second half showing, his side wouldn’t be winless for much longer. As it happened, after another game without a win the following midweek he was sacked – such are the fine margins in football.

Entering the dressing room the mood was every bit as euphoric as it had been following the Kremin game. I stared at the scene in front of me for a moment and then picked up a water bottle from the carrier that had been placed on the physio’s bed. I kicked the door shut as hard as I did and then threw the bottle down on the floor as hard as I could. The lid flew off and the plastic cracked, sending water everywhere. The rumpus suddenly stopped, replaced by stunned silence.

‘Sit down, shut up!’ I roared, a departure from my usual calm demeanour. ‘That first half was excellent, well done.’ I stated. ‘But that second half was absolutely f***ing embarrassing. You should be f***ing ashamed. Apart from him,’ I pointed at Dyachenko, ‘who was f***ing immense in that second half, the rest of you were an absolute f***ing shower. That doesn’t f***ing happen again.’

I turned around and nodded to Danny. ‘Feel free to translate that in any way you want.’ I told him before opening the door and nearly taking it off its hinges and storming back down the tunnel to do a couple of laps of the pitch to calm myself down.

Perhaps I’d gone too far in there, I reflected as I jogged around the playing field. Perhaps not, though. There was no harm in making the players understand that once they’d set high standards that they would have to work hard to maintain them and in spite of being four-goals to the good, the second half had been a long way off what I’d come to expect. What they’d led me to expect. It was a display of sheer arrogance and bombast that was completely unbecoming. At the very least I expected hard-work but I didn’t get that. Hopefully, I’d gotten my point across.

The three points had increased our advantage over the chasing pack after defeats for Desna and Obolon-Brewer. We were now 4 points clear and had picked up our eighth straight win in all competitions. That was something that quickly bought me back round and by the time I’d completed my third circuit of the pitch, I was ready to go upstairs and buy the lads a round of drinks to show that there were no hard feelings.

Rukh Vynnyky 4-1 Mykolaiv

Team: Dyachenko, Markovych, Chepelyuk, Duts, Pysko, G.Baranets, Verbnyi (Panasyuk, Grysyo,  Bidlovskyi (B.Baranets), Glagola (Kozlovskyi), Khomchenko

Subs not used: Illyuscehenkov, Kopyna, V.Bilyi, Zastavnyi

Shots: 16 - 10

Shots On Target: 11 - 5

Possession: 54% - 46%

Link to post
Share on other sites

Saturday 19th August 2017 – Results and Table

Avangard Kramatorsk

3-4

Kremin

Ingulets-Petrove

2-0

Desna

Kolos Kovalivka

2-0

Girnyk-Sport

Naftovyk-Ukmafta

2-0

Obolon-Brewer

Poltava

0-0

Arsenal-Kyiv

Rukh Vynnyky

4-1

Mykolaiv

Sumy

1-2

Balkany Zorya

Volyn

4-0

Cherkaskyi Dnipro

Zhemchuzhyna Odesa

3-1

Gelios

 

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Rukh Vynnyky

11

9

0

2

22

7

27

15

Obolon-Brewer

11

7

2

2

11

7

23

4

Volyn

11

7

1

3

17

6

22

11

Kolos Kovalivka

11

6

4

1

20

11

22

9

Desna

11

7

1

3

18

10

22

8

Naftovyk-Ukmafta

11

4

5

2

12

8

17

4

Arsenal-Kyiv

11

4

5

2

11

9

17

2

Balkany Zorya

11

4

4

3

14

13

16

1

Zhemchuzhyna Odesa

11

4

3

4

12

12

15

0

Gelios

11

3

5

3

9

9

14

0

Kremin

11

4

1

6

20

28

13

-8

Girnyk-Sport

11

3

3

5

10

12

12

-2

Poltava

11

3

3

5

11

15

12

-4

Sumy

11

3

3

5

14

19

12

-5

Avangard Kramatorsk

11

3

2

6

17

18

11

-1

Ingulets Petrove

11

2

2

7

6

12

8

-6

Cherkaskyi Dnipro

11

2

0

9

8

24

6

-16

Mykolaiv

11

0

4

7

4

17

4

-13

Link to post
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

13.       Ukrainian First League: Balkany Zorya v Rukh Vynnyky (23rd August 2017)

 

I couldn’t sleep in the aftermath of the Mykolaiv game. I always found it hard to sleep after a game – there was so much churning away in my mind; things we had done well, things we could do better whether that was collectively or individually on my part.

The one thing I’d always struggled with when growing up was when I lost my temper. It seldom happened, I was quite a placid guy rarely given to outbursts or rushes of blood. But occasionally, very occasionally, I needed to let rip from time to time. It was the same as a kid. I remember once having a football blasted into my face at point blank range – purely by accident – yet the moment it happened I completely flipped. Before I knew what I’d done, I literally kicked Liam, the guy who had found the target with unerring and unlikely accuracy, bang up in the air. No sooner had Liam gotten back to his feet and walked six paces away from me and I felt overcome by guilt. He refused to talk to me for weeks, always walking off whenever I approached our group of common friends and shunned any attempt by me to apologise. That only made my internal wrangling all the worse.

And although not so acute, that was still the case right through to the aftermath of the second half against Mykolaiv and even to the present day, as I sit here in my 80s overlooking the Black Sea in my secluded dacha scribing these memoirs, the blinding rage followed by crippling levels of guilt occasionally rear their ugly demonic heads.

Although stopping short of apologising at training on the Monday morning, I did gather the boys together to tell them that I was more than happy with the result and parts of the performance and that these elements were what we needed to take forward into our next game, the Wednesday evening journey to Zorya to take on mid-table Balkany.

Maxym Grysyo sat out training on both the Monday and Tuesday with a niggle on his knee meaning that I would have a late decision to make on whether to start him. With Eugene Lozovyi still ruled out for another month or so following his injury in the cup a fortnight before, options weren’t exactly plentiful down the right flank. Grygoriy Baranets was the most natural right-sided player left, but with Yuriy Tkachuk still missing, I didn’t really have much cover in the middle of the park either.

‘So, what do you think?’ I asked, chewing thoughtfully on my pen.

Sat across from me in my office in the three black leather easy chairs that I’d been able to source were Olexandr and Sergiy plus Danny who was acting in his unofficial role as translator. I’d come up with three potential solutions, none of which particularly appealed enormously to me as a perfect solution and whilst usually I’d be comfortable taking an executive decision, I couldn’t choose between them.

The first was to move Andriy Markovych forward into the advanced right-sided spot and then bringing in either Vasyl Bilyi or Yukhym Konoplya, who was on the verge of signing on a similar basis to Oleg Glagola from Shakhtar, at right-back. Markovych was quite clearly the best option of the naturally right-sided options available to me as an attacking force. Vasyl was nominally a centre-half who was fairly comfortable at right-back but would be as out of place as a penguin would be on the moon if asked to attack down the right-flank whilst Yukhym, who I’d had assessed by the scouting team, was perfectly steady and reliable defensively but treated the ball like a Mills bomb when in possession.

Option 2 was to keep Volodymyr Bidlovskyi in situ down the left-flank and bring in Borys down the right. Much more comfortable on his right foot that Volodymyr, Borys would be able to maintain some degree of balance but the question would be whether he would have the confidence to go outside the left-back and use his right foot from the by-line or whether his natural inclination would be to cut inside onto his natural left side. Whilst that could have its benefits, it would end up narrowing the game rather than stretching it, which was what the entire premise of our shape was based on. There was the option of asking Andriy to bomb on more and provide an outlet on the overlap from right-back, but again this wasn’t something I was entirely comfortable with as I liked the security blanket of having my full-backs staying at home.

The final option was playing the Kozlovskyi junior out wide on the right with messrs Glagola and Khomchenko through the middle. Since the latter two had linked up well at the weekend, I was loathed to break-up that burgeoning partnership and whilst Svyatoslav had shown little in the way of much aptitude for playing through the centre, he was at least used to being in the attacking third. However, I wasn’t convinced how hard he’d track back since it wasn’t really a requirement for my centre-forwards once the ball had gone beyond an opposition deep-lying midfielder. That said, sticking a striker out wide wasn’t the most unusual of stop-gap options.

‘No no no!’ Sergiy responded emphatically when I mooted this third option. ‘Put this one out of your mind, Paul.’

Olexandr was nodding sagely.

‘You agree with Sergiy?’ I asked him.

‘Da.’

‘Why?’ I challenged.

‘Well, for one, he’d struggle positionally, he’d feel constricted on the touchline and would drift in-field and end up swamping Oleg. I’ve seen it a thousand times before when strikers are asked to play wide.’ Olexandr replied, ticking off the point with a finger. ‘Secondly, he won’t be used to tracking back to help Andriy defensively. There’s every chance he could get exposed quite easily and leave Andriy facing a 2 v 1 situation. That would not be agreeable. Thirdly, I don’t think that he has the pace or quick feet needed to create anything.’ He ticked off this point with his middle finger. ‘He’d work hard and wouldn’t stop running but I don’t think it would be particularly constructive.’

I nodded, making a note on my pad before glancing up at the first-team coach. ‘Sergiy?’

‘I agree with Olex,’ he said matter of factly.’ ‘If we didn’t have better options then, sure, we play Svyatoslav there, but that is the worst of the three in my view.’

‘Fine, we’ll park that idea then,’ I replied, putting a cross through the bottom third of the flip-chart that I’d scribbled on whilst explaining my thoughts. ‘What about moving Andriy forward and putting Vasyl in at right-back?’

‘I like this idea,’ Olexandr replied.

Sergiy looked at him askance, incredulity dripping from his facial expression like blood from a barely grilled rib-eye.

‘Go on,’ I prompted.

‘Andriy used to be a winger as a youngster and was converted into a full-back when he made the step-up to the Under-21s at Karpaty.’ The assistant explained. ‘You’ve seen for yourself that he can deliver a ball from out wide, he’s got the ability to do that.’

‘Yes, yes he has,’ Sergiy interjected with a sniff, ‘from 40 metres out when no-one’s pressuring the ball.’

‘You’re not convinced?’ I asked him.

‘I don’t know what kind of herbs and spices Olexandr’s been putting in those roll-ups of his, but Andriy’s got the acceleration of a lawnmower which is fine when he’s got a winger running at him and he’s only 20 metres from his own goal, but he’s no more likely to get beyond a full-back than I am and I turn 60 in a few months.’

‘Oh, come on,’ Olexandr protested, ‘that’s horse-sh*t and you know it, Sergiy. The only way you’re getting beyond anyone is on a mobility scooter!’

The older man turned on my assistant, eyes blazing but before he could physically accost Olexandr, Danny had swiftly put his hands on his shoulders to keep him sat down, talking to him in a placating tone with words that I didn’t understand. Glancing at Olexandr I spotted an unmistakeably mischievous twinkle in his eye.

‘Can we continue?’ I asked once Sergiy had recovered himself. The two coaches nodded.

‘Okay. Sergiy, why would you go with Borys down the right?’

The grey-haired man steadfastly refused to look in his colleague’s direction as he spoke. ‘He knows the job, he’s played wide all his life. He can beat his man either with a trick or a burst of pace that’ll buy him a yard or two to whip a cross in and he’s equally good off either foot.’

‘No he isn’t!’ Olexandr cried out.

‘Okay, okay,’ Sergiy swiftly retorted, holding his hands up in defence. ‘Not equally good, but his delivery will be better than Andriy’s would be.’

‘No it wouldn’t!’ That’s just nonsense, Sergiy.’

‘It’s not nonsense at all!’ Sergiy responded. ‘Andriy wouldn’t get within 30 yards of the by-line because the left-back would just run him out of the game. There’d be no service coming from that flank at all.’

‘Just as there wouldn’t be with Borys there! He’d just come inside all the time onto his left foot, I’ve seen him do it time after time, it’s habit!’

‘At least there’d be some space then for Andriy to overlap into if he did.’

‘You’ve just said that Andriy lacks pace and would deliver nothing from that flanks!’ Olexandr exclaimed with increasing exasperation. Poor old Danny had his work cut-out translating whilst the two were going hammer and tongs at each-other, mercifully verbally rather than physically this time.

‘Even he might have half a chance with no-one within 10 metres of him!’ Sergiy shouted, his face reddening.

‘GENTLEMEN!’I yelled, bringing the two men’s attention back to me. ‘Thank you. I’ve taken on board both of your opinions.’ I brought my voice back to its more natural timbre. ‘There isn’t a perfect solution to be had so we’ll have to do the best we can. I’ll have a think overnight and come to a decision overnight. Goodnight.’

With that terse dismissal, the three men got up and absented themselves from the office and left me sat gazing out of the window at the darkening sky outside, reflecting on the fact that although I was in full agreement with the two of them about Kozlovskyi, the two of them had been less useful than a screwdriver in the hands of a man trying to pitch a tent. To be fair, both had valid points as to the pitfalls of either solution, but they hadn’t told me anything new. All that was left was to sleep on it and make the decision before training the following day so that we could at least get the boys concerned ready for the change. Not the ideal preparation for the game by any stretch.

***

After a restless night, tossing and turning, it was Borys who got the nod and took his place in the side for the visit to Balkany in the city of Zorya in the only change from the weekend side. Maxym Grysyo, although not 100% fit had been passed clear for a place on the bench and could be used if absolutely necessary. Joining him on the bench was our new loanee from Shakhtar, Yukhym Konoplya.

Olexandr Dyachenko

 

Andriy Markovych           Olexandr Chepelyuk      Igor Duts ©        Mykhaylo Pysko

 

Nazar Verbnyi                   Grygoriy Baranets

 

Borys Baranets                                                                                  Volodymyr Bidlovskyi

 

Oleg Glagola      Victor Khomchenko

 

Our opponents were firmly ensconced in mid-table, their four-match unbeaten run pushing them up to 8th spot. Although they were in a decent run of form, we’d won 8 on the spin and conceded just twice in that spell. Although we were missing four, possibly five lads who would probably have started the game if they’d been fit, there was nothing that led me to think that we couldn’t continue our run and put some pressure on the sides below us in the table.

The pre-match comments were all about making sure our focus was right, to put into practice all the good things we’d been doing in recent weeks and that if we matched them for hard work, then the quality would be able to shine through. There were no real concerns over Borys’ place on the right flank after he’d done well there in training the previous day and Olexandr had told Andriy to keep an eye open for the overlap if the man in front of him did come inside onto his left foot.

The buzzer went and out they went, looking the part. Motivated and ready for the task ahead.

Although the hosts shaded the opening quarter of an hour, forcing Dyachenko into a couple of comfortable saves, we looked fairly comfortable and slowly began to find ourselves getting into the game when, in the 17th minute, a free-kick from mid-way inside the Balkany half was floated into the home penalty area by Igor Duts. Nazar Verbnyi went up to win the header and as he was in mid-air received the merest of shoves from Petro Stasyuk. The contact happened in full view of the official and since it was enough to send Verbnyi under the flight of the ball, he needed no second invitation to blow his whistle and point to the penalty spot.

After a few moments whilst the referee fielded some rather irate enquiries from a couple of blue-shirted defenders as to the veracity of his decision making and quality of his eyesight, calm was restored and Mykhaylo Pysko had the chance to make it three goals in three games from the spot.

He sent the goalkeeper the wrong way right enough, but also got under the ball and sent it cannoning off the face of the crossbar at great pace. ‘Ah, for f***’s sake!’ I exclaimed in frustration as Stasyuk got to the rebound before Volodymyr Bidlovskyi was able to and hooked it clear as the frame of the goal continued to rattle. The sigh of relief from the home dugout to my right was clearly audible at the let-off.

On the half-hour mark a free kick on the left edge of our penalty area was lined up by the left-foot of 38-year old left-back Dmytro Parkhomenko. Everything pointed to him swinging the ball into the heart of the penalty area yet Dyachenko was taking no chances and set a four-man wall up. No matter, Parkhomenko curled an absolute peach of a strike around the edge of the wall and inside Dyachenko’s near post to give the hosts the lead. A quite brilliantly executed set-piece which even I had to applaud, inwardly, whilst turning to Vsevolod and questioning the composition of the goalkeeper’s wall and then his positioning.

A goal down and aside from the penalty kick, we’d not created a lot in spite of plenty of huff and puff. That said, the boys didn’t let their heads drop after falling behind and indeed, did manage to create something a couple of minutes before the break. Khomchenko received the ball 30 yards out after a ball into the box was headed clear and spotted the run of Borys inside the full-back. The pass was neatly executed but fell to Borys’ right foot instead of his left and he failed to get the purchase he wanted on it, forcing a good save from Sergiy Lukash, where had the ball fallen on his left-side you would have put money on the net billowing.

‘The next goal’s crucial, boys.’ I told them at the break. ‘If you get it then I think we’ll win the game. Just make sure you give nothing away and give yourselves a mountain to climb. Okay?’ Nods and grunts of encouragement.

Wise words so often go unheeded, don’t they?

Not five minutes into the second half and Demjan Penov collected the ball outside his own penalty area and launched a counter-attack, sweeping the ball forward to Sergiy Ursulenko just inside halfway. The striker took a heavy touch but was able to recover the ball thanks to my back-four already in pell-mell retreat. His ball found Roman Loktionov, but Duts came across nicely to win the ball and get it clear towards halfway.

Stasyuk won the ball though without either Khomchenko or Kozlovskyi challenging and pinged a lovely ball wide to Oleg Tsymbalar down the Balkany left. He managed to outpace Markovych and from the by-line deliver a delicious cross to the far post where Pysko, instead of covering the far-post, had been sucked three or four yards too far infield leaving Loktionov with the simplest of tasks to nod the ball beyond Dyachenko from five-yards out to double the hosts’ lead.

‘What the heck?!’ I spluttered, aghast, as the ball nestled in the back of the net and the goal-scorer took the acclaim of his team-mates. ‘Did I not tell them to not give anything away? What was Maxym doing marking Duts? Bloody hell!’

Five minutes later and another Tsymbalar cross had been met by a towering, if unchallenged, Kostayantyn Parkhomenko header which was thankfully a foot too high and I responded immediately by replacing Duts and Grygoriy Baranets with Vasyl Bilyi and Oleg Panasyuk respectively. We were at sixes and sevens – eights even – and I wanted the changes to steady the ship if nothing else since they were unlikely to provoke a comeback.

With a two-goal cushion in the bank, Balkany were content to sit deep, soak up what pressure we were able to put them under, watch a number of efforts that lacked conviction sail either high or wide and hit on the counter-attack.

With eight minutes remaining, a bit of a lazy Markovych ball forwards towards my third sub, Kozlovskyi, was cut-out by Bogdan Salamakha who then fired a long ball through the middle which split Olexandr Chepelyuk and Bilyi leaving Ursulenko clear on goal. He calmly drew Dyachenko and slid the ball nimbly beyond the hopelessly exposed goalkeeper to make it 3-0 to the hosts.

I looked on dumbfounded during the closing stages, quite unable to work out where this result and performance had come from, helpless as the hosts began to toy with us, drag us every which way and other and going close again through Ursulenko to making it 4-0.

The final whistle was a mercy. All I could do was to shake hands with the third member of the Parkhomenko dynasty, manager Andriy and congratulate him on a job thoroughly well executed before turning and trudging down the tunnel, hands firmly plunged into my trouser pockets and already mulling over where things had gone wrong.

Entering the dressing room, I was met an unusual volley of deathly silence. To a man the boys looked shattered, unable or unwilling to look anyone in the eye, shirts strewn angrily across the floor.

‘Forget it, lads.’ I said calmly, recognising this time that laying into them would probably be fairly unhelpful. ‘It’s done. We lost, we were crap, we move onto the next one. Get showered, get changed and get some food.’

Leaving the dressing room, I was at least able to slightly console myself that we had another game in just three days to right the wrongs that I’d witnessed then. However, if we lost that one as well, it would be a full fortnight before we played again due to the international break. I knew only too well from bitter experience how long those two weeks could feel. It was simple, then, wasn’t it? Win at the weekend whatever the cost.

Balkany Zorya 3-0 Rukh Vynnyky

 

Team: Dyachenko, Markovych, Chepelyuk, Duts (V.Bilyi), Pysko, G.Baranets (Panasyuk), Verbnyi, B.Baranets  Bidlovskyi, Glagola, Khomchenko (Kozlovskyi)

Subs not used: Illyuscehenkov, Grysyo, Zastavnyi, Konoplya

Shots: 7 - 11

Shots On Target: 3 - 1

Possession: 49% - 51%

Link to post
Share on other sites

Wednesday 23rd August 2017 – Results and Table

Arsenal-Kyiv

0-0

Ingulets Petrove

Balkany Zorya

3-0

Rukh Vynnyky

Cherkaskyi Dnipro

2-3

Poltava

Desna

4-1

Naftovyk-Ukmafta

Gelios

1-4

Volyn

Girnyk-Sport

4-2

Sumy

Kremin

2-1

Zhemchuzhyna Odesa

Mykolaiv

1-1

Avangark Kramatorsk

Obolon-Brewer

2-1

Kolos Kovalivka

 

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Rukh Vynnyky

12

9

0

3

22

10

27

12

Obolon-Brewer

12

8

2

2

13

8

26

5

Volyn

12

8

1

3

21

7

25

14

Desna

12

8

1

3

22

11

25

11

Kolos Kovalivka

12

6

4

2

21

13

22

8

Balkany Zorya

12

5

4

3

17

13

19

4

Arsenal-Kyiv

12

4

6

2

11

9

18

2

Naftovyk-Ukmafta

11

4

5

2

12

8

17

4

Kremin

12

5

1

6

22

29

16

-7

Girnyk-Sport

12

4

3

5

14

14

15

0

Zhemchuzhyna Odesa

12

4

3

5

13

14

15

-1

Poltava

12

4

3

5

14

17

15

-3

Gelios

12

3

5

4

10

13

14

-3

Avangard Kramatorsk

12

3

3

6

18

19

12

-1

Sumy

12

3

3

6

15

23

12

-8

Ingulets Petrove

12

2

3

7

6

12

9

-6

Cherkaskyi Dnipro

12

2

0

10

10

27

6

-17

Mykolaiv

12

0

5

7

5

18

5

-13

 

The good news that we remained top, but with wins for Obolon-Brewer, Volyn and Desna, the latter two sides picking up comprehensive 4-1 wins, our lead had been cut from 4 to just a single point. At the bottom Mykolaiv were still awaiting their first win of the season after drawing 1-1 with Avangard Kramatorsk, a point that took them out of the bottom four overtaking Sumy, who conceded goals on 89 and 92 minutes to lose 4-2 at Girnyk-Sport, on goal difference.

Link to post
Share on other sites

Thursday 24th August 2017

I called the boys into the ground for an hour on Thursday evening. Firstly, without going into too much depth, we discussed the previous evening’s events in Zorya and what had happened – I put the defeat and lacklustre performance down to nothing more than fatigue. Upon reflection, thirteen games in just seven weeks had taken its toll. Some players were injured, others were carrying niggles and some were having to play when they ought really to be pulled out of the firing line and having a rest. I couldn’t be too hard on them since they’d given me absolutely everything since the season’s start and the good had far outweighed the bad. Sure, there was plenty to work on still, but if anyone had offered me being top of the table with just over a third of the season gone, I’d have checked them for a fever and called the local slaughterhouse to have them taken away and made into chops.

We then spent 45-minutes talking about the weekend’s game with Girnyk-Sport back at home with Danny presenting and going through their preferred patterns of play and how to combat them before just asking them for 1 more big effort before the international break.

I knew that Maxym Grysyo would be fit and thus remove the conundrum surrounding the right-flank, I then had a question over whether Borys should start on the left instead of Volodymyr or whether to keep faith with the younger man who had performed well over the previous couple of weeks. There was a chance that Vladyslav Bugay might be fit too, he would undergo a thorough fitness test before the game to see if there was any chance he could make the bench at the very least.

Sergiy, Olexandr and I spent an hour discussing drills and ways to keep training fresh over the fortnight’s break whilst also agreeing to give the boys three days off from Sunday onwards to rest, refresh and relax. It would do them good to get away from the game for a few days, decompress and focus on other pursuits, I was becoming aware myself of just how exhausting and intense our schedule had been.

Cramming a third of the season into the space of two months made sense given the Ukranian climate, after the break the temperature would begin to plummet and it wouldn’t be too long before the frosts hit and made evening football rather more of a lottery than it had been up until this point. We only had one midweek game scheduled for after the break, the cup visit to Ingulets Petrove in mid-September, something which would provide us with the chance to really focus on refining our style of play and, hopefully, improving the injury situation.

On the Thursday evening, I received another invitation by phone for the following evening to from Vasyl Makarov to meet up with the supporters – something which I readily accepted however with a promise that it would involve rather less consumption than two weeks before had done.

‘Of course, Mr Paul. We take care of you. No problem.’ The giant had assured me.

I received another call that was rather more intriguing too, somewhere around 10pm just after I’d showered and was preparing to read the latest batch of scouting reports in bed with a nightcap. I didn’t recognise the number when it flashed up on my phone, but it was from the UK.

‘Paul Tilletson.’

‘Ah, Mr Tilletson!’ came the female reply from the other end. The well-spoken English accent sounded almost unfamiliar and I quickly realised that it was the first I’d heard since my all too brief conversation with Lottie shortly after my arrival in Lviv. ‘My apologies for the imposition, my name is Liz and I work for The Independent. Your daughter gave me your phone number.’

‘What can I do for you, Liz?’

‘Well, we are running a series of articles on Englishmen cutting their managerial teeth abroad over the international break and were wondering whether you would be open to us including a feature on yourself?’

This came as something of a surprise.

‘What would it involve?’ I asked.

‘If possible, we’d like to send someone over to watch your game at the weekend and then spend some time talking to you about what it is that took you to the Ukraine…’

‘Ukraine,’ I interrupted.

‘Sorry?’

‘It’s just Ukraine, not the Ukraine. Sorry, pedantic, I know.’

‘Oh, right. Apologies. Anyway, as I was saying, we’d like to spend some time talking to you about life and football in Ukraine, what your aspirations are for the future and also, if possible, speak to some of the players and maybe the chairman about your impact so far.’

I thought for a moment. The idea was a good one and the sort of thing that I’d enjoy reading about myself. The fact that it was The Independent and not a toe-rag publication appealed to me meaning that sensationalism should be kept to a minimum and that I should hopefully remain largely under the radar, outside the consciousness of the average Sky Sports News viewing football bore.

‘Mr Tilletson?’ Liz prompted after the moment’s silence.

‘What would you need from me to set this up?’ I asked eventually.

‘We would take care of everything like accommodation and provide an interpreter where required, if you could possibly try and fix some time with some players and the chairman then that would be brilliant.’

A moment more silence.

‘Okay, sure. Why not.’ I said. ‘When will they be over? And who will be doing the feature?’

‘Oh, thank you, Mr Tilletson. That’s wonderful!’ the voice on the other end gushed. ‘It’ll be Tom Barney who’ll be coming over and he’ll arrive on the WizzAir flight number W94485 from Luton which is due in at 10:55am tomorrow morning.’ That was remarkably quick work, I thought, having all the flight details to hand.

‘Had you booked this already?’ I asked with a note of amused suspicion in my voice.

‘We had taken a calculated gamble, yes.’ Liz admitted with a chuckle.

I laughed. ‘Fair enough! I’ll meet Tom and whoever else has come over from the airport in the morning and take him straight to the ground where he’ll be able to watch the final hour or so of training and then he’ll be at liberty to see what he wants and speak to whoever he wants.’

‘That’s fabulous, thank you, Mr Tilletson.’ Liz said in that gushing tone again. ‘With your permission I’ll pass your contact details onto Tom and tell him to expect you in the morning.’

Once the call had ended, I scrolled through my contacts, found the one I wanted and tapped out a message.

Lottie, heard from Indy today. Thanks for putting them in touch. Hope you’re well, missing you. Dad x

A moment later my phone vibrated and I opened the reply. It consisted of just seven letters, three of which were ‘f’ and that formed two words together. Raising my eyebrows in mild surprise at my daughter’s ready potty mouth, I buried the phone under my pillows and opened the foolscap folder on the bed.

Link to post
Share on other sites

14.       Ukrainian First League: Rukh Vynnyky v Girnyk-Sport (26th August 2017)

TILLETSON LVIVING AND LVOVING LA VIDA LOCA

By Tom Barney

(from The Independent Friday 1st September 2017)

Talk to a supporter of any club that Paul Tilletson played for about him and the chances are they’ll smile and say something along the lines of ‘Oh, now, he was a good player.’ And he was. During a playing career that lasted for 19 years and took in 6-clubs both in England and north of the border, Tilletson was a player who, in years to come, will likely be mentioned alongside the likes of Hoddle, Gascoigne and Le Tissier as players with a born natural talent that bordered on  the obscene and that deserved far greater exposure at the highest level than his 25 international caps provided.

Whilst Hoddle has moved on with some success to management in the Premier League before gravitating towards punditry, the same post-career job that Le Tissier gravitated to, and Gascoigne has battled various demons, Tilletson’s first steps into his post-playing life have taken him into unfamiliar climes, the Ukrainian second tier.

After retiring due to persistent and varied injury problems at the end of 2016, Tilletson spent some time scouting for Oxford United in the latter half of last season before a chance meeting with former the former Chelsea and Russia goalkeeper, Dmitriy Kharine, opened an unexpected door for the former Portsmouth man.

‘I knew Dimi from my few months on-loan at Celtic as a youngster,’ Tilletson explains ‘and I’d been asked to go and watch a lad who was doing well at Hemel Hempstead Town for Oxford. When I arrived, I noticed it was Dimi warming up the two goalkeepers and after a few minutes he recognised me.’ Kharine’s playing career had concluded with a handful of appearances for Hornchurch in the mid noughties and he had been goalkeeping coach at the National League South club for a number of years. ‘After the game we had a chat for about half an hour and the conversation moved onto my next steps. I told him that I was hoping to find a managerial or coaching job somewhere out of the media glare when he mentioned that he might know of a couple of people back in the USSR, as was, that might be able to help me out.’

Not expecting anything to materialise from the conversation, Tilletson admits to being surprised when he received a call in the summer from the owner of Rukh Vynnyky, Grygoriy Kozlovskyi, inviting him for an interview. ‘It came totally out of the blue, I simply wasn’t expecting anything to come of it.’ Tilletson admits.

‘Of course, I knew of Paul as a player,’ Kozlovskyi says, ‘but I didn’t realise he had been influenced by the Eastern European game growing up.’ Tilletson’s nickname during his spell at Liverpool had been Marxy, after the father of communism, due to his insistence on continually referencing obscure moments of 90’s Eastern European football. ‘Hearing that a former international player might be interested in coaching your team is quite a big deal so it felt silly not to at least have a chat with him.’

Rukh, based in the small town of Vynnky about a dozen miles east of the Western Ukranian city of Lviv, were approaching their first ever season in Ukraine’s Highest League and had just lost the head coach, Ruslan Mostovyi, who had gained promotion and had taken a job at the Lviv’s premier club, Karpaty as the head of youth development.

The chat was a success with each man coming away impressed by the other. ‘Grygoriy struck me as a man that just wanted to best for his club and was prepared to offer me a decent level of autonomy which was something I wanted for my first job.’

‘Paul seemed to understand football,’ Kozlovskyi says as we talk at the back of the open air main – and only – stand at Vynnyky’s 900 capacity Bogdan Markevych stadium, named after the club’s founder. ‘He talked clearly and simply about the game, how he sees it and what he would aim to bring to the club if given the job. Sometimes, when you’re an owner or president, coaches don’t treat you as an equal when talking football – instead they talk down to you as if you don’t understand the game.’ Negotiations were swiftly concluded – literally – ‘Paul offered to work for less than I offered him,’ Kozlovskyi explains, still shaking his head in mild bewilderment, and the Englishman duly put pen to paper on a one-year deal.

How, then has the relationship between president and coach stood up two months in? ‘Grygoriy’s been good as gold,’ Tilletson says, leaning back in the chair behind the desk in the portacabin office that sits in the car-park of Rukh’s home ground. ‘I won’t pretend coming here wasn’t a bit of a culture shock, it was,’ he admits. ‘Although we’re in the second tier and fully professional, everything about the club was no better than what you might see in the lower levels of the Isthmian League back at home. I’ve come in and tried to shake things up a bit by getting things running a bit more professionally and even though we literally don’t have a pot to **** in,’ his earlier tour of his office did not include any mention of a toilet, ‘so long as I’ve been able to justify the benefits that a request I’ve made would bring, he’s moved heaven and earth to facilitate things.’

Tilletson readily admits a tinge of guilt at requesting things when he knows only too well the parlous state of the club’s finances. ‘It’s a really difficult balancing act. I know full well that Greg puts in absolute buckets of his own money to keep the club solvent but I think he recognises that’s why there’s a need to invest now in the infrastructure of the club, to put things in place so that we can organically grow.’

Indeed, progress on and off the pitch has been swift. Going into the weekend game at home to Girnyk-Sport, a club sat just below half-way a dozen matches into the season, Tilletson has Rukh sitting pretty at the top of the division having won 9 of their 12 matches to date, a point ahead of Obolon-Brewer. ‘It had been four’ he explains, ‘but we got hammered on Wednesday 3-0 and Obolon were able to cut the deficit.’ That defeat brought a run of seven straight league wins to an end.

‘He’s been brilliant for us,’ goalkeeper Olexandr Dyachenko says of Tilletson after training and lunch the day before the game. ‘He’s introduced us to a slightly different way of playing than we’re used to, but the lads have all bought into what he’s trying to do and so far, it’s been pretty successful.’

‘We’re far more attack minded than we were, even last season when we were one of the favourites for promotion,’ explains popular veteran winger Borys Baranets. ‘It’s a different mindset than we were used to, but we quickly saw the benefits and that’s helped us get on board.’

Fan Engagement

18-hours before a crucial league game kicks off, Tilletson leads me into a dark back-street bar. ‘I came here a fortnight ago not knowing what to expect.’ He recounts a tale on the walk from the hotel to the bar of how he offered a trio of Rukh fans that had made the long journey to the war-torn city of Kramatorsk a lift back to Vynnyky on the team coach and how that had led to him meeting the president of the Rukh supporters club, Vasyl Makarov, to invite him to an informal gathering of the supporters. ‘They meet the evening before every weekend home match and drink. They drink and they drink and I don’t think they stop until kick-off the following day.’

‘So, when did you escape a fortnight ago?’ I ask.

‘About four hours later than I meant to!’ Tilletson chuckles. ‘It’ll be different tonight,’ he adds with as much certainty as is able to muster. When asked what his reaction would be if he heard that one of his players had been sampling the best spirits Vynnyky had to offer deep into the small hours the night before a game? ‘Do as I say, not as I do.’ He replies with a wry smile.

Makarov cuts a forbidding figure at first glance, giving off the air of a fairy-tale ogre but once we’re acquainted via Tilletson and we both have a drink in hand, his rugged exterior gives way to a thoughtful and intelligent character. ‘Everyone was desperately sad to see Ruslan leave, he had not only brought success to Rukh that we never imagined we’d see, but we recognise our place in the world and the job at Karpaty was one that he couldn’t turn down.’

So, what of the decision to appoint Tilletson? ‘Well, the supporters were split. Some thought we should wait and see, others were fuming. They thought Kozlovskyi had sold the soul of the club to try and gain headlines with the appointment of a big-name.’ When asked which camp he found himself in Makarov was disarmingly forthright. ‘I thought it was a nonsense. What could he possibly know about the Ukrainian second tier? What could he provide that someone local couldn’t?’ And now? Makarov pauses a moment, choosing his words carefully. ‘He’s started well and has brought some entertaining football to the club. No-one expected us to be where we are in the league, we thought that staying clear of the bottom four would be a good achievement. We’re not far off the number of points needed to ensure that already, I don’t think. And he seems to recognise the fans – he doesn’t have to come out the night before a big game, we didn’t expect him to but here he is, mixing with everyone and making them feel a part of the club.’ One could sense a ‘but’ not far off as the huge man neatly finished his glass and bellowed for a refill.

‘But,’ he duly continued, ‘some of us are not sure of his motives. I mean, why did he choose Rukh? What is he here for? He seems honest enough and talking to him he comes across as very genuine but when talk turns towards next season and beyond he becomes a bit evasive. If, by some miracle, he manages to lead us into the Highest League then make no mistake, he will forever be a legendary figure at Rukh regardless of what happens next, but we have lacked continuity at the top and I think the club would really benefit from that stability. I don’t know if Tilletson will provide that or not.’

We stay a couple of hours and on the walk back to the hotel I put Makarov’s fears to Tilletson. ‘I realise it’s a cliché, but I genuinely haven’t thought any further than tomorrow at this point. I’m here until June and it’s a lovely club. The people here, the players, the fans – they’re all just brilliant and couldn’t have been more welcoming to me. I have to be realistic though, if I fail to win between now and the turn of the winter break then all of a sudden there’s going to be a whole chunk of pressure on me and, perhaps more importantly, Grygoriy.’ Is his future dependent on promotion? ‘Absolutley not, no. I’d love nothing more than to take Rukh up, I think that would be an incredible achievement but that’s not to say that if I did that I would still be here next season and that if I didn’t then I wouldn’t. There’s a whole host of factors that would need considering.’

Tilletson refuses to be drawn on his longer-term aims as well when asked about whether he’d like one day to manage in the Premier League. ‘There’d be some clubs I’d be interested in coaching, of course, anyone would be,’ he says, ‘but that’s so far off down the road that it’s on another continent at the moment. Tomorrow may end up being my final ever game in management, I have no idea what the future will hold.’ He notices my look. ‘I realise it sounds glib and cliched and all the things I hate but I don’t have a grand plan. Of course, I’m hugely ambitious and I want to manage at the highest level possible but it’s only a select handful that are good enough to coach at the very top and I haven’t a clue whether I will make it – I’ve only been in the dugout for a dozen matches so far (a baker’s dozen as it happens) and have had a fair wind behind me so far. I just want to take it one step at a time.’

Glag to be Alive

Match-day begins with the players all gathering for lunch before their young analyst provides a slick 20-minute PowerPoint presentation on the vagaries and quirks of that day’s opponents. It’s only half a dozen slides but 26-year old Danylo Monotenko, who also unofficially acts as Tilletson’s translator in the dressing room, manages to distil plenty of information and, judging by the regular chuckles, a little humour into the meeting.

The warm-up is led by Tilletson’s coaching staff, assistant manager Olexandr Drachenko and Sergiy Diev whilst the two goalkeepers are put through their paces by goalkeeping coach Vsevlod Romanenko. Tilletson, meanwhile, watches on from the touchline. ‘I like to watch the warm-up from a distance,’ he explains. ‘It gives me a feel for how the players are mentally and enables me to tailor my final pre-match words accordingly. Today, we’re looking okay. Better than Wednesday,’ he replies to the unanswered question. Although he doesn’t mention it, he also spends a bit of time watching the opposition’s warm-up, one suspects probing for any sign of weakness. In little more than 24-hours, he strikes any observer as a details man, leaving as little to chance as possible.

With fifteen minutes to go before kick-off, the players return to the spartan dressing room in the bowels of the stand to go through their final preparations. Tilletson observes for five minutes before whistling for the players’ attention. It’s noticeable that he has as much control over his charges as a champion shepherd in One Man and His Dog has over a border collie. Silence falls and wait. Flanked by Drachenko behind one shoulder, Diev behind the other and with left-back Mikhaylo Pysko getting his left ankle re-strapped on the physio’s couch, Tilletson speaks in English, no more than three sentences.

‘Wednesday is gone, lads.’ He says and pauses whilst Monotenko translates. ‘I need one more big effort from you this evening, make those balls in from wide areas count. Press high, work hard and good luck.’

That’s it. Not in the least bit Churchillian, but certainly not lacking in assertiveness. The players nod and then finalise their preparations as Tilletson goes around the room clasping hands with each of the players in turn, pausing for a brief word with some of them before the buzzer goes.

‘Go get them, lads! Enjoy yourselves!’ he shouts above the clatter of studs on the tiled floor before opening the door and letting the red shirted players make their way out into the tunnel to form up behind the referee.

The crowd, which Tilletson later told me was 311 strong, was well dotted throughout the stand and gave the impression of an early season County Championship fixture. I found myself sat next to the injured captain, Yuriy Tkachuk, who was on a season’s loan form Karpaty. He’d missed the previous two games and was a week or so from returning to full training. ‘I hope to be back for the next game after the break,’ he told me at half-time. During the game, though, he was fully focused on the game.

Tilletson patrolled his technical area, often with his arms folded or one rested on the other and twiddling his red beard as he cut a thoughtful figure. Occasionally he’d stop and bark an instruction or point a direction to one of his players, sometimes he’d duck into the dugout and say something to his coaching staff which would result in them leaping up and barking an instruction themselves.

His side settled into an early pattern of passing the ball around confidently and competently. Their opponents, coming into the game off the back of a 4-2 midweek success kept them largely at arm’s length before suffering a large dose of ill-fortune just past the half hour mark.

A free-kick some 30-odd yards from goal was lined up by Volodymyr Bidlovskyi following a foul on Oleg Glagola. The strike at goal was powerful enough and it glanced off the head of Georgiy Chelidze on the end of the wall, completely wrong-footing his goalkeeper and sending the ball inside the far post to give the hosts the lead. ‘We deserved to be ahead, but yeah, there was a fair amount of fortune about the execution,’ Tilletson later admitted.

They received a further boost shortly before the break when the Girnyk midfielder Chelidze, who endured an afternoon to be forgotten, received his second yellow card after pulling back Grygoriy Baranets inside the centre-circle having been nutmegged by the Rukh midfielder, a trick that was reminiscent of his manager in his pomp.

At the interval I spoke to Tkachuk, an impressive young man who had been signed before Tilletson’s arrival. ‘He’s brought something different to the club, something you don’t really see in Ukraine.’ He said. When asked what exactly that was, Tkachuk went on ‘well, it’s a much more attacking way of playing than you usually see here. I mean, unless you’re Dynamo (Kyiv) or Shakhtar, where you’re expected to win every game, then teams are far more reactive than proactive. Paul has tried to get us to work on being on the front-foot for the full ninety-minutes, to press high and force errors.’ I asked how much of a departure that had been for him. ‘Huge,’ he admits, ‘but then when you realise that if you win the ball back in the opponent’s right-back area and just how much closer to their goal you are, you realise why he wants the two wide-men playing as out and out wingers, on the opposing full-back’s tiptoes. It’s taking time to adjust, but everyone can see why he wants what he does.’ Does he think that they would be topping the table without Tilletson’s influence? ‘Quality wise, I haven’t seen anything that is better than us so far,’ he says, ‘but I don’t think what he’s brought to us in terms of being on the front foot probably has won us some games that we might have settled for a draw from under some others. It’s a moot point to be honest,’ he goes on, ‘just speculation. But he’s a lot of fun to work for and I think we’re all really enjoying being part of things here at the moment.’

Although in total control of the second half, it isn’t until nine minutes from time that the points were secured. It’s a moment well worth waiting for though as Girnyk’s stubborn resistance is broken with a moment that elevates the afternoon above routine from Rukh’s point of view. A neat move beginning with Verbnyi inside the centre circle sees the ball fed into Baranets and worked wide to the right for Grysyo. The winger’s early cross caught the Girnyk back-four slightly on their heels and as it fell for Glagola 20-yards out, the on-loan striker thumped a delicious first-time volley beyond the goalkeeper’s vain dive and into the top corner of the net. It was a goal fitting of an audience far greater than the one that witnessed it and one which Tilletson toasted as ‘simply outstanding’ after the game.

‘It feels a bit churlish to be critical after a comfortable 2-0 win,’ Tilletson says over a glass of wine in his office long after everyone else has packed up and gone home. ‘And whilst I’m delighted with the clean sheet and 3 points, especially after Wednesday, I really wanted us to impose ourselves a bit more on them in the second-half when they were a man down. Tire them out and go for the throat a bit. It felt a bit safe at times.’ When asked whether he’s nit-picking a bit he laughs. ‘Yeah, I probably am to be fair, but I don’t think there’s anything wrong in pursuing perfection, I think that drives high standards.’

The win coupled with a surprise 1-0 defeat for 2nd placed Obolon-Brewer at relegation threatened Sumy has seen Tilletson’s side extend their lead to 2 points. The two sides meet in a fortnight time as Rukh hit the road after the international break. ‘That’s going to be a big test for us,’ he says, ‘a real chance for us to prove our credentials and that we need to be taken seriously. We did that last month when we went and won 1-0 at Volyn. After Obolon we have Desna at home and although they’ve slipped up a little bit in the past couple of weeks, they’ll be there or thereabouts at the end of the season.’

Will he believe then that his side are genuine contenders if they come through those two matches unscathed? Again, the question is met with a laugh. ‘We’ve given ourselves something to build on. If the lads maintain their levels of performance and hard-work then who knows, but I’m certainly not going to start taking anything for granted until we’ve earned the right to do so by getting enough points on the board.’

There’s a quiet shrewdness about Tilletson. He doesn’t make outlandish pronouncements, keeps his cards close to his chest yet is disarmingly honest. It’s an approach which doesn’t really fit with the media-heavy hyperbole hyperbowl of the Premier League yet, one can detect an underlying determination that means that if he wants to go to the very top, it would take a brave soul to bet against him doing so.

Rukh Vynnyky 2-0 Girnyk-Sport

Team: Dyachenko, Markovych, Chepelyuk, Duts, Pysko (B.Baranets), G.Baranets, Panasyuk (Verbnyi), Grysyo,  Bidlovskyi, Glagola, Khomchenko (Bugay)

Subs not used: Illyuscehenkov, V.Bilyi, Zastavnyi, Konoplya

Shots: 17 - 6

Shots On Target: 5 - 1

Possession: 61% - 39%

Link to post
Share on other sites

Saturday 26th August 2017 – Results and Table

Avangard Kramatorsk

0-2

Balkany Zorya

Cherkaskyi Dnipro

0-0

Arsenal-Kyiv

Kolos Kovalivka

1-0

Desna

Naftovyk-Ukmafta

1-1

Ingulets Petrove

Poltava

0-0

Gelios

Rukh Vynnyky

2-0

Girnyk-Sport

Sumy

1-0

Obolon-Brewer

Volyn

2-0

Kremin

Zhemchuzhyna Odesa

1-1

Mykolaiv

 

 

P

W

D

L

F

A

Pts

GD

Rukh Vynnyky

13

10

0

3

24

10

30

14

Volyn

13

9

1

3

23

7

28

16

Obolon-Brewer

13

8

2

3

13

9

26

4

Desna

13

8

1

4

22

12

25

10

Kolos Kovalivka

13

7

4

2

22

13

25

9

Balkany Zorya

13

6

4

3

19

13

22

6

Arsenal-Kyiv

13

4

7

2

11

9

19

2

Naftovyk-Ukmafta

13

4

6

3

14

13

18

1

Zhemchuzhyna Odesa

13

4

4

5

14

15

16

-1

Poltava

13

4

4

5

14

17

16

-3

Kremin

13

5

1

7

22

31

16

-9

Girnyk-Sport

13

4

3

6

14

16

15

-2

Gelios

13

3

6

4

11

14

15

-3

Sumy

13

4

3

6

16

23

15

-7

Avangard Kramatorsk

13

3

3

7

18

21

12

-3

Ingulets Petrove

13

2

4

7

7

13

10

-6

Cherkaskyi Dnipro

13

2

1

10

10

27

7

-17

Mykolaiv

13

0

6

7

6

19

6

-13

 

Hardly a blistering afternoon of action with the nine fixtures producing no more than a dozen goals. Obolon-Brewer’s surprise defeat at Sumy sees them leapfrogged by Volyn who slide into second place following their comfortable 2-0 win over Kremin. The unlikely 3 points for Sumy is enough to move them out of the bottom four. The clash between fifth and fourth sees Kolos Kovalivka boost their promotion hopes with a 1-0 win over Desna,

The bottom three all picked up points but with Sumy’s win, they’ve fallen further behind the guaranteed safety line.

Link to post
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...