Mentor Gornyakov told how his team was able to turn the tide of the game and win over Kolos
Head coach Shakhtar Marino Pusic gave a comment after a bright but difficult victory over Kolosom (3:2) in the 20th round match Ukrainian Premier League.
“It was typical [пропущенный] goal – I mean it came from a mistake on our part against a team that plays quite low and defends a lot and so it wasn’t easy to find space in their defence. The game has just started – and suddenly you are already losing 0:1. We, of course, should not have allowed this to happen, and I did not like this situation at all.”
“Then we tried to play our football, we had the ball, but we didn’t create any serious opportunities: maybe we had one or two chances, but we made a lot of wrong decisions, playing too quickly and simply through the middle of the field. Also, the pressure at that moment was not ideal. I had several options in my head on how to solve this issue, and I chose the appropriate one: we knew that we played a lot in the opponent’s half of the field, we could press well, so I brought in a second striker and a winger, and from that moment we played with three defenders “
“And in fact, in the second half we demonstrated fantastically how we should act, because we changed the rhythm, the energy of the game, and resisted the opponent’s attacks much better. I’m very happy with the second half – we deserved to score goals and win. My only complaint is that we should have decided the result of the game much earlier because we had many good chances but didn’t score. And I was also a little upset by the last goal, because we conceded two goals in the second game in a row. This should not happen during the competition for first place.”
“But overall, we deserved this win because we changed our rhythm after the break. It was a very good victory. Why? Not just because of the three points, you can see it everywhere: if you play the last match of a round and all your competitors lose points, then you feel the pressure and often lose points too. But we didn’t lose them, and that’s good for us. So to sum it up: I’m not happy with our first half, I’m very happy with the second half and it’s a good win.”
Let us remind you that Shakhtar missed Oleg Ilyin in the opening and could not do anything with the opponent before the break. New players came out for the second half, and two foreign players – Kevin and Lassina Traore – ultimately made the game. The Brazilian scored his debut goals for the new club, the Burkinabe scored an assist, a goal and an own goal in stoppage time.
The victory allowed Shakhtar to lead the UPL standings for the first time in a long time. SK Dnepr-1 is two points behind and has played two more games. Tomorrow Krivbass can catch up with Pusic’s team if they beat Obolon.
In the next round, Shakhtar will host Minaj on March 1.
Source: Sportarena
I’m Todderic Kirkman, a journalist and author for athletistic. I specialize in covering all news related to sports, ranging from basketball to football and everything in between. With over 10 years of experience in the industry, I have become an invaluable asset to my team. My ambition is to bring the most up-to-date information on sports topics around the world.
