The miners in Hamburg will play against Porto, the match starts at 22:00
Shakhtar nominally starts the group stage with a home match against Porto Champions League 2023/24.
This match will be the fifth in the history of confrontations between the Ukrainian and Portuguese giants. The teams previously met in the group stages of the Champions League of the 2011/12 and 2014/15 seasons. The miners have never defeated the dragons until now: two defeats and two draws.
Let us remember that last year Shakhtar, under the leadership of Igor Jovicevic, had a very successful start in the main European Cup, defeating Leipzig away in the first round (4:1). As a result, the orange-and-blacks scored 6 points in a group with the German club, Real Madrid and Celtic and continued to play in the Europa League, where they were eliminated by Feyenoord at the 1/8 finals.
The Donetsk team entered the new season with a new head coach, Patrick van Leeuwen. The Dutch specialist noted that in his debut Champions League match he will be missing several defenders, but there is someone to replace them. Let us remind you that the Donetsk club’s application for the match against Porto did not include three central defenders – Nikolai Matvienko, Valery Bondar and Dmitry Chigrinsky.
In addition to Porto, Shakhtar’s opponents in Group H are the Spanish Barcelona and the Belgian Antwerp. The Ukrainian champion is by no means a favorite to make it to the playoffs – analysts give the Miners only 20% to reach the 1/8 finals of the tournament.
The match in Hamburg at the Volksparkstadion will begin at 22:00 Kyiv time. The match will be judged by the Italian team of referees led by Davide Massa.
Source: Sportarena
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