Shevchenko's Failed Experiment, Uncertain Future for Konoplyanka and Pyatov. Reviewing Ukraine's September Cycle

3 points from the matches against Switzerland and Spain: good or bad? Honestly, who cares.

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the players and coaching staff of the Ukrainian national team had not seen each other for about 9 months, so many had missed the team led by Andriy Shevchenko. The September matches in Nations League Group A, the elite group our players qualified for based on the results of the previous edition of the tournament, offered the chance not only to assess the current form and cohesion of the national team, but also to see how it looks against Europe's strongest teams.

The matches against Switzerland and Spain turned out, as expected, to be different, both in the final result and in the game shown by the Ukrainian national team. But there are reasons for that.

In the Nations League, Shevchenko does not depart from his style of play

The painful defeat against Spain should not be a reason for great disappointment. Yes, the score is unpleasant and reminds us of the previously familiar failures against top opponents, but it is still not worth overrating the tournament in which this defeat took place — the Nations League, although it has the status of an official international tournament, is in fact a set of glorified friendlies with heightened responsibility.

Yesterday's match in Madrid — is proof of this: Spain's head coach Luis Enrique changed more than half of his lineup compared to the match against Germany the day before. Although his team only drew with the Germans, against Ukraine he unhesitatingly gave many players new to the national team a chance to play.

Shevchenko, in turn, made only one precise change to the lineup (Marlos instead of Júnior Moraes), but his experiment was about something else: trying to play one of the world's strongest teams at the football they are known for, with possession and building up from the back through passing. “The task was to test our strength, play football with them, control the ball,” — left-back Bohdan Mykhailychenko admitted after the match. — What did Shevchenko say [after the match]? Not to get too upset and to keep preparing.”

It turned out, to put it mildly, so-so, but Shevchenko and his coaching staff got plenty of food for thought. After all, you don't learn only from wins.

Taras Stepanenko is irreplaceable in midfield

Literally on the day of the match against Spain, it became known that Taras Stepanenko, one of our national team's key players in midfield, was out of action with a knee injury — . Yevhen Makarenko was called up as his replacement, but in fact Shevchenko was choosing mainly between Serhiy Sydorchuk and Ihor Kharatin.

To the surprise of many, Shevchenko's choice fell on the midfielder from Hungary's Ferencváros, where he is one of the core players of Serhiy Rebrov's team. But with this, the head coach only emphasized his desire to contend with Spain in possession — Kharatin's main advantage over Sydorchuk lies precisely in his higher-quality and faster ball progression forward through passing.

In the end, Kharatin, like the other newcomers, fell short against Spain, spending almost the entire match facing his own goal and showing that he is not an equivalent replacement for Stepanenko in terms of volume of defensive work and ability to act under pressure. One would like to say that this is only for now, but Ihor is already 25 and has been playing in Europe for a second year.

The future of Andriy Pyatov and Yevhen Konoplyanka in the national team is in question

After this mini-cycle, the squad will next gather in a month, when Germany and the same Spain await us. And if the question of the No. 6 position should be resolved with Stepanenko's return, then on several other positions Shevchenko will almost certainly debate with his assistants. And if the question of the right-back, given Tymchyk's lack of international experience and the dressing-down he received from Ansu Fati in Spain, was open and still remains so, then the puzzle at goalkeeper and left wing is precisely a consequence of these September matches.

With Konoplyanka the situation is clear: he does not have a place in Shakhtar's starting lineup and is not always Luís Castro's first choice for substitutions. The fact that Shevchenko started him against the Swiss from the first minutes spoke more of a desire to rest Marlos before Spain than of high hopes for Konoplyanka. His unconvincing performance in Lviv and absence from the starting lineup against Spain only confirmed these doubts.

But Andriy Pyatov raises different questions. First, he is already 36, and the moment when he will have to hand over the role of national team No. 1 to the talented Andriy Lunin is not far off. Second, the defeat to Spain is largely his fault. Yes, he may not be directly to blame for the four goals conceded, but the number of errors he made with his feet was unacceptable for a captain at a time when young partners in defence needed confidence in their abilities, not knees trembling.

It's time for Zinchenko to come back down to earth

The last few years have been nearly perfect in the life of Oleksandr Zinchenko. He has managed to establish himself in the lineup of one of the world's strongest teams, though not in his natural position, and often gets game time. Last year he even signed a new five-year contract with City, receiving on top of that the fairly prestigious No. 11 shirt. Everything is also going well with the national team, where he has become part of the unchanging trio in midfield of Shevchenko's new side alongside Stepanenko and Ruslan Malinovskyi.

What he can hardly count as a plus — is the post-quarantine period, during which he succeeded on the personal front (getting married), but lost out on the football front (losing his place in City's starting lineup, even despite the health problems of direct rival Benjamin Mendy). After that he also got caught up in a scandal when his newlywed wife publicly criticized head coach Pep Guardiola.

Zinchenko also can hardly count the matches against Switzerland and Spain as a plus, even despite a great winning goal in the first match — overall it was not a particularly convincing performance, and there were gross giveaways in dangerous areas in both games. What surprised even more was his behavior after mistakes: putting his head down and tracking back headlong — no, that's not him, but lecturing Pyatov, who allegedly played a not very convenient pass and provoked the error — that's exactly his thing.

Don't do that, Sasha.

***

After two opening matches, Ukraine has 3 points in its account, but overall the tournament situation hardly interests anyone. Yes, if they reach the Nations League Finals, direct qualification for the EURO can be counted on, and in case of failure they could again drop into League B, but this hardly makes the attitude toward the Nations League truly serious — after all, in truly big international tournaments you have to play not only against equals.

Vasyl Obaraz, TK Media