Shovkovsky: We wish it to become stronger in the summer. Will it work, we’ll see

Head coach Dynamo Alexander Shovkovsky commented on the spectacular victory over Krivbass (3:1) in the last home match of the season, and also shared his plans for the near future.

“Of course, we prepared for this game after the defeat, that is, after all the tournament tasks were completed. The only thing I asked my guys was to be completely professional, to prepare for the game, knowing and understanding the mood with which the team under the leadership of Yuri Nikolaevich Vernidub is preparing. We understood perfectly well that it would not be easy, although Krivbass, like us, fulfilled its tournament goals. But our meetings are always characterized by integrity, it’s very interesting to play, but at the same time it’s not easy.”

“You know, when there are no tournament tasks, you can resort to certain experiments. Many teams play according to this tactical scheme [с тремя защитниками], and we must understand that we may need to rebuild. We had chances, we could score, but not everything worked out; a few events on the field did not turn out as we planned, so during the break we decided to return to our traditional scheme. But I think this first half will definitely give us some options in the future.”

“Is everything okay with Yarmolenko? There were clashes, game moments that always occur in football. I hope there was nothing serious there. We waited until the end of the first half so as not to make a premature substitution, we thought perhaps he would be released during the break, but, unfortunately, the pressure was quite strong, it was hard for him to breathe. After the game I already talked with Andrey, he feels fine, and I think that in the near future he will fully recover and everything will be fine. Brazhko also had a hard collision, he received a blow. I think in a day or two, he’ll be fine too.”

“After the game with Shakhtar, I had a conversation with the head coach of the national team. We talked a lot about the condition of the players, their attitude to work. And we agreed that the players go to this game, play as much as possible, and after this match we give them a short break, a mini-vacation, so that they can rest for about a week and then begin preparations for Euro 2024 as part of the national team.”

“There will be a lot of talk around transfers now – the off-season, agents are working, forces we have never seen before… I can say – don’t read a lot of newspapers at night. We have certain developments, we want to strengthen ourselves. We’ll see if it succeeds.”

Let us remind you that Dynamo already scored two goals against Krivbass by the sixth minute, but quickly conceded in response and were able to consolidate the result only at the end of the game. Andrei Yarmolenko spent the first half on the field (and earned a penalty from which Vladislav Vanat opened the scoring), Vladimir Brazhko was replaced in the 71st minute.

Dynamo took second place ahead of schedule in this UPL season (as did Krivbass – third). In the last round, Shovkovsky’s team will play away against Rukh, which is fighting with Dnepr-1 and Polesie for a place in the European competition.