Lazio 5, Shakhtar 1
As we know, everybody is a soccer expert. Everybody who knows the rules of the game can assess the it at his discretion, casting aside the highbrow reasoning of so-called experts who try to hide the essence behind unintelligible verbiage. Soccer is popular the world over precisely because its logic or, if you like, philosophy is clear to everyone. This a simple and simultaneously superb game which has conquered the world precisely owing to its simplicity and accessibility.
It is impossible to picture professional soccer without the people who write, speak, and comment on it. All this should be done not because somebody will not understand without a journalist’s help what exactly has happened on the pitch but because one feels like sharing his soccer-induced emotions with somebody else. It is for this reason that improvised soccer debate clubs gathered in every city in the sixties and seventies, thus making up for the absence of enough soccer newspaper and television reports. Now, we can compare every day our own impressions of soccer with the unchecked flow of information that in fact fills all the newscasts.
But sometimes you do not feel like doing so. There is no wish to hear the confirmation of what you saw by yourself and to again feel disappointment mixed with humiliation. We all did and do feel joy that our soccer has got another strong and stable club, Donetsk Shakhtar (coal miner). We wanted this Ukrainian club to confirm its class not only here but also abroad. It was pleasant to watch the ensemble of promising players brought up by coach Viktor Prokopenko to be a maturing and gaining experience. So it is on the crest of this upsurge that our runner-up champion has received a loud slap in the face from the champion of Italy. Lazio players openly hazed the coal miners like a veteran might haze a rookie. Our side diligently followed the coach’s instructions, boldly contesting the ball, and even opened the score after an irreproachable strike by Andriy Vorobei. However, each episode and encounter showed the indisputable superiority of the Romans in the class of their play.
It should be admitted that Shakhtar has achieved precisely what it could count on. The club deservedly qualified for the Champions League group tournament and could even have gone further had there been other teams in the group. But sooner or later it would have inevitably come across a European super club which would have put the record straight.
The resounding defeat Shakhtar suffered in Rome has called up numerous associations and comparisons, including one with Kyiv Dynamo (there is nobody else to compare to). Vorobei’s goal against Lazio brought to mind a still very young Serhiy Rebrov who scored a beautiful goal against Barcelona at Nou Camp in the fall of 1994. Then the enraged Barcelona, like Lazio on Wednesday, literally cut up the Dynamo defenses, hitting home in reply to Rebrov’s goal the handful of balls required for an overall victory. I also recalled last year when Dynamo played Lazio in the Champions League first group tournament. That time also the Italian champion decisively outplayed the Ukrainians, in fact fielding a second-string team in Kyiv. Yet, the Kyivans lost 1 to 2 and 0 to 1, while our Donetsk novices got 0 to 3 and 1 to 5. Feel the difference? It took the Kyiv side several years to learn to keep themselves from the number of goals that a higher-class rival wanted to score.
The ability to avoid a crushing defeat is also a sign of class. Even when losing, Lobanovsky’s team continues to play intelligently on the defense. Sometimes this irritates you: look at them defending when they should run forward! Shakhtar vividly demonstrated in Rome how one can run forward and what this comes to. You will not see a goalie-forward face-to- face duel, which Claudio Lopez managed to achieve, even in the nation’s second division matches, where the players in fact do nothing but mark time. It was decided to reinforce the Donetsk team’s far from monolithic defensive line with the exotic African, Okoronkwo. The number of mistakes the completely relaxed foreigner made was enough for a central fullback to be benched for good.
Let us not analyze all the mistakes our miners made in Rome. Most of them were caused by the inability, rather than unwillingness, of our side to play better. Shakhtar is still to challenge the UEFA Cup and the next year’s Champions League, for which the Donetsk team can be eligible as no longer the runner-up but the champion of Ukraine. And every defeat, even such an ignominious one as in Rome, will do the promising soccer club good.
We should not try to forget Shakhtar’s shame in Rome. It is better to remember this match so that we could have something to compare to in a few years, when the Donetsk side will have turned, let us hope, from a European rookie into an adequate rival for any, even a superstar, team. If Dynamo managed to pass this way, why should Donetsk Shakhtar not do likewise?
