President of the Football Federation of Ukraine (FFU) Anatoliy Konkov has said that he will try to resolve the issue of the head coach of the national football team by the end of this year, but he declined to talk about on potential candidates for this post.
“We will make every effort to do that, we will have a friendly match in February and an official match in March. And the coach also needs time just to look around. I understand that there’s not much time… I won’t talk about potential candidates now,” he said in an interview with the Ukrainian Football publication, which was released Tuesday, when asked whether the issue of the team manager will be resolved by the end of the year.
In connection with the speculation in the media around this issue, Konkov agreed with the view that it had been unnecessary to disclose that there had been negotiations with English football manager Harry Redknapp in public.
“Now I understand that it was necessary to keep it all in silence, in secret,” he said.
Konkov said that it was the right decision to publicly announce an offer for Ukrainian football star Andriy Shevchenko to take charge of the team.
“I was sure that he would agree. And I still think that his work with our national team would be an interesting and innovative move by the FFU. Why? Because Shevchenko is a true Ukrainian, and he is a hundred percent ours in terms of spirit. I thought that he would be interested in this way of working. I made a mistake,” Konkov said.
