“It is a humiliation of football to send fans to a national team game!”

UAF President Andrey Pavelko On the air of the TIME program Denisov expressed his opinion on UEFA’s decision to award a technical defeat to the Ukrainian team in the Nations League match against Switzerland.

– What is your position on the decision made regarding the selection of Ukraine?

– I understand all the emotions of the fans. I have the same. Our position is clear and we express it in the arguments of the Appeals Session. Now we are waiting for the motivational part. It is very interesting to read. At the end of today or Monday, we will get the motivation for this decision. After that, we are preparing a position at the Lausanne Court of Arbitration for Sport, where we will be represented by very strong lawyers.

I am pleased that all the fans and citizens of Ukraine have rallied around this situation. They are not indifferent to the fate of our team and the honor of Ukraine. There were many calls from government agencies, from lawyers from well-known law firms. At CAS, we will also be accompanied by Spanish and Swiss lawyers who will have a very clear position that this decision should be reviewed. This is a lousy candidate for European and world football.

– Is the UAF going to Lausanne?

– Yes. This is an unequivocal position.

– The Swiss team said Ukraine did not do enough to avoid a technical defeat. What are you talking about?

– Today, covid is the main challenge of all European football. Globally, all regulations were adopted to protect soccer players from such a challenge. The worsening of the coronavirus in Europe and around the world could cause a change in competition schedules. This has a bad tendency for decisions in any direction to be made very quickly.

Over time, we will go through this challenge and analyze the decisions that were made previously. It is very bad if it is explained that inappropriate or not entirely correct decisions were made.

– What did you do wrong, according to your opponents? There was a conversation that you didn’t bring to the team in 24 hours.

– The second team is the legal aspect. The national team had to provide a team for this game if a team is unable to enter the field. These are all the challenges of the time, the challenges of covid.

In club football it is possible, but in the national team it is a different position. UEFA provided at least 48 hours for these decisions. All experts and specialists understand that it is a humiliation of football to send a team of fans to a match of national teams.

I am sure that in a while we will go down this path and we will definitely defend the interests of our team and the interests of our country until the end. There will be a heated discussion at CAS. She will be in Switzerland.

We have many arguments in favor of our position. This is confirmed by all our Spanish lawyers and colleagues, including the Swiss. It was also not clear to Swiss journalists and fans how the team, which had not won a single game this year, retained its place in the Nations League elite.