Ukraine national soccer team coach Mykhailo Fomenko is giving youth a chance in the next two penultimate European championship qualifiers against Belarus and Slovakia on Sept. 5 and Sept. 8, respectively.
The youngest and debuting among the 25
players called up is Shakhtar Donetsk’s 19-year-old midfielder Viktor Kovalenko.
Joining him are Zorya Luhansk midfielder
Ruslan Malinovsky and Shakhtar midfielder Maksym Malyshev, both aged 22. Zorya
forward Pylyp Budkivsky, 23, rounds up the youthful part of the squad.
Ukraine is in third place in qualifying group
C, six points behind leader Slovakia, and three behind second-place Spain. It
faces Slovakia away in Zilina, and Spain at home in Kyiv on Oct. 12 in the
final qualifying match.
Kovalenko shined for the Ukrainian youth
team, becoming the best scorer in the World Cup under-20 tournament with five
goals. He debuted for Shakhtar in the UEFA Youth League group stage match
against Real Sociedad in September 2013. He ended up scoring six goals in the
youth league competition, four of which in the tournament phase.
“The training staff of the national team
has enough reason to acquaint itself with the talented debutant and test his
readiness to play with the best players of the country,” Ukraine’s national
soccer team said in an online statement.
Called up only for their second cap are
Malyshev and Malinovsky. The latter was called up in March to play in a friendly
match against Latvia, while Malyshev was summoned for the June 14 qualifier
with Luxembourg, but didn’t take the pitch.
Dynamo Kyiv has the largest
representation on the team with eight players, six of whom are midfielders.
Curiously, not one Dynamo goalkeeper, either Maksym Koval or Oleksandr Rybka,
were called up. Shakhtar follows with seven players, three of whom will defend
the backfield: Vyacheslav Shevchuk, Oleksandr Kucher and Yaroslav Rakytsky.
Zorya and Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk each are contributing four players.
Ukraine’s most capped player, 36-year-old midfielder Anatoliy Tymoshchuk,
now plays for Kazakhstan’s Kairat Almaty club. Over the summer, Spain’s Sevilla signed left winger
Yevhen Konoplyanka, who was also called up to play on the opposite side of
Dynamo’s right winger Andriy Yarmolenko.
The nine group
winners, the nine group runners-up and the best third-placed side qualify
directly for the final tournament.
The eight remaining third-placed teams will contest play-offs to determine the
last four qualifiers.
Twenty-four
teams will compete in France for the European soccer championship taking place
on June 10-July 10, 2016. It is overseen by UEFA, Europe’s top soccer governing
body.
Ukraine squad
Goalkeepers: Andriy Pyatov (Shakhtar Donetsk), Denys
Boiko (Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk), Mykyta Shevchenko (Zorya Luhansk)
Defenders: Artem Fedetsky (Dnipro
Dnipropetrovsk), Vyacheslav Shevchuk Oleksandr Kucher, Yaroslav Rakytsky (Shakhtar
Donetsk), Yevhen Khacheridi (Dynamo Kyiv), Andriy Pyliavsky (Zorya Luhansk)
Midfielders: Oleh Husiev, Andriy Yarmolenko, Serhiy Sydorchuk, Denys
Harmash, Serhiy Rybalka, Mykola Moroziuk (Dynamo Kyiv), Ruslan Rotan (Dnipro
Dnipropetrovsk), Taras Stepanenko, Maksym Malyshev, Viktor Kovalenko (Shakhtar
Donetsk), Ruslan Malinovsky (Zorya Luhansk), Anatoliy Tymoshchuk (Kairat
Almaty, Kazakhstan), Yevhen Konoplyanka (Sevilla, Spain)
Forwards: Yevhen Seleznyov (Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk), Pylyp Budkivsky (Zorya
Luhansk), Artem Kravets (Dynamo Kyiv)
Group С
№ | Team | Matches | Wins | Draws | Losses | Goals (for/against) | Points |
1 | Slovakia | 5 | 5 | 0 | 0 | 11:2 | 15 |
2 | Spain | 5 | 4 | 0 | 1 | 14:3 | 12 |
3 | Ukraine | 5 | 3 | 0 | 1 | 6:2 | 9 |
4 | Belarus | 5 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 4:10 | 4 |
5 | Macedonia | 5 | 1 | 0 | 4 | 5:12 | 3 |
6 | Luxembourg | 5 | 0 | 1 | 4 | 3:14 | 1 |
Source:
Football Federation of Ukraine
Kyiv
Post editor Mark Rachkevych can be reached at [email protected].
