The coach of the “white-blues” admitted that his team made a large number of mistakes.
Head coach of Dynamo Kyiv Oleksandr Shovkovskycommented on the crushing defeat from Rome's Lazio in the match of the first round of the main stage of the Europa League of the 2024/25 season.
The match, nominally home for the “white-blues”, at the Volksparkstadion arena in Hamburg, Germany ended with a score of 0:3 in favor of the Italian club.
“Of course, it is very annoying to lose matches, especially at the start, and in general with such a score. But at this level, opponents do not forgive mistakes. We gave our opponent two goals, which were scored through the central zone. We will still look at these moments, analyze them, but giving the opponent such a handicap is unacceptable.
We came out for this game and wanted to play football. We could have closed up and waited, but I want to give my players the opportunity to play football, create combinations, and finish them. We had opportunities, but we conceded because of mistakes in the center of defense. And it's hard for me to add anything about this. This probably shows Lazio's class – when there are such opportunities, they use them.
I can't say that Ceballos' injury had any particular impact. But, again, I repeat that we made significant mistakes, and these mistakes were specifically in defensive actions. I won't dwell on individual players, but, in my opinion, we have no right to allow the opponent to easily pass through the center of defense and give them the opportunity to score goals,” the official Dynamo website quotes Shovkovskiy as saying.
In the second round of the Europa League, Kiev will play away against German Hoffenheim on October 3. Before that, Dynamo will visit Left Bank on September 29 as part of the Ukrainian Championship.
Recall that in the updated format of the Europa League, 36 clubs play in a single league, where they will play against eight different opponents (four home and four away matches).
All of Dynamo's opponents in the main round of the Europa League: Roma (Italy), Lazio (Italy), Ferencvaros (Hungary), Real Sociedad (Spain), Galatasaray (Turkey), Viktoria Plzen (Czech Republic), RFS (Latvia), Hoffenheim (Germany).
The eight best teams of the main stage of the Europa League will reach the 1/8 finals. The clubs that take places 9th to 24th in the overall standings will play paired play-off matches for a place in the 1/8 finals. The rest will finish their performance in European competitions.