meet the future rival of the ukrainian national team – football.ua

Tomorrow, March 28, the Ukrainian team will celebrate its second fight in the classification for the next World Championship, in which it will fight with Finland. On the eve of the match in Kiev, we decided to take a closer look at our future opponent.

History

For many decades, the Finnish national team was in the cohort of the weakest teams on the continent, without really proclaiming any great achievement. The reasons were several, the main of which was the unpopularity of football in this country (by the way, in 2010, it occupied a leading position in physical training and physical activity of residents of Europe), which preferred hockey, the automobile and motorsports, skiing, trampoline jumping, in a word, whatever you want, but not football.

Until the early 1980s, the Finns mostly hung out with their Scandinavian neighbors, and it was not a matter of taking part in big tournaments. The selection for the 1980 Italian European Championship changed everything. “Suomi” almost left a strong quartet (so the selection system was somewhat different, and only the winner of the group received a ticket to the continental forum) with Greece, Hungary and the USSR. The problem with the owner of the lucky ticket to Italy was decided in the last round, where Finland desperately needed to defeat the Soviet team. However, it did not work to achieve an acceptable result: we drew, escaping from defeat at the end, but nothing more.

Another opportunity appeared in the qualifying for Euro 2008 under the direction of his well-known Roy Hodgson.

The Finns found themselves in a difficult group with Poland, Portugal, Serbia, Belgium, Kazakhstan, Armenia and Azerbaijan. The Blue and Whites were cut to the last drop of blood, for example, they never lost to the Portuguese who were going through a generational handover, and also scored four points out of six with the Poles, who became the winners of that octet. . In the event of a victory over the Lusitanians in the last round, it was “Suomi” who would have reached the Austro-Swiss Eurocup, but only a zero draw took place in Porto.

And in November 2019, Finland, for the first time in its history, celebrated reaching an important tournament, namely Euro 2020. The question with the second permit holder (the first place was reserved in reinforced concrete by the magnificent Italy Roberto Mancini) was known as early as halfway through that group, largely due to Greece’s next fiasco in recent years, and was officially determined after the victories of Markku Kanerva’s offices over Armenia and Liechtenstein in the last rounds (two times 3: 0). Not only that, UEFA also fined the future rookie of the European Championships for the invasion of delusional fans on the field at the end of the encounter with the dwarf state.

Stadium

The Finns hold their home matches in Helsinki, at the Olympic Stadium, with a capacity of 37,500 people. The arena was commissioned in 1938 and in 2005 it was rebuilt.

During its existence, the stadium has mainly hosted the World and European Championships in Athletics, the European Women’s Championships in 2009, as well as the 1952 Summer Olympics. Furthermore, the UEFA Super Cup will take place here next year. .

Legends of the past

There are few options here: Jari litmanen and Sami hyyupia.

Both players, especially when it comes to Litmanena, he made a real revolution in his country, forcing the football world to look at Finland in a new way.

After playing for various national teams, Jari set out to conquer the Netherlands with Ajax. The crown for the Amsterdam part of the player’s career was undoubtedly victory in the 1994/95 Champions League, and the replacement of Litmanen by Patrick Kluivert in that encounter was of decisive importance.

In September 1995, the Finnish soccer legend managed to score a hat-trick against Ferencvaros in the Champions League, which became the country’s first and only player in the main European Cup.

Then there was Barcelona, ​​Liverpool, then a return to Ajax, and Litmanen ended his career at HJK. In addition, Jari holds the record for his national team for number of matches (137) and goals (32, but soon this record will likely be broken by Teemu Pukki).

Hyupia is known throughout the football world as part of the legendary Liverpool team that won the “ears” trophy at the 2005 Istanbul final. Sami spent most of his playing career on the “red” field and also won all possible trophies with the exception of the Premier League.

Ukrainian trace

In the long and eventful history of the championship of Ukraine, there were only four representatives of this northern country.

In the 2019/20 season, a Surinamese midfielder spent 44 minutes in the Lviv Carpathians – Abukar Mohamed Abdulkadir.

In the period from 2011 to 2014, a defender played for Arsenal in Kiev Lampi Veli, and in the 2009/10 campaign ten meetings were held for Kharkiv Metalist Alexey Eremenko.

But the main Finnish legionnaire was, of course, Alexei’s namesake: Novel, forever remembered by fans of the Kiev Dynamo and UPL.

Previous meetings with the Ukraine national team

Our team has met Finland in official matches only once: in qualifying for the World Cup in Russia. Then the “blue-yellow” won two minimum victories: 1: 0 d, 2: 1 g.

We wrote more about these fights in our article yesterday.

Trainer

Markku Kanerva topped the Finnish national team in 2016.

Before heading the Finnish main team, Kanerva briefly coached Viikingit, as well as the U21 national team.

The coach, by the way, who previously worked as a school teacher, participated in two of the most important achievements in the history of local football.

First, for the first time in history, he led the Finnish youth team to Euro 2009, where, however, Suomi did not score a single point for falling into the deadly foursome with future tournament winners Germany, England and Spain.

Secondly, as we have already discussed in the historical part of this material, they are preparing to debut alongside the main Finnish team at the future European Championship.

The composition and tactical drawing of the game.

Consider the composition of the Finnish national team that played in the match with Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Ess Joronen will likely take a spot in goal, replacing Bayer Leverkusen’s main goalkeeper Lukasz Hradecki, who injured Achilles in February’s Bundesliga duel with Mainz.

Yoronen made his Suomi debut in 2013 with Miksu Paatelainen, playing the entire 90 minutes in a friendly against Thailand. All in all, the Brescia goalkeeper has only three official matches for Finland, including the last match with the Bosnians.

Despite the limited CV in the national team, Esse is an experienced goalkeeper who has eaten more than a pinch of salt in the same Brescia or Copenhagen.

Markku Kanerva most of the time use 4-4-2 and 5-3-2 settings, where the only option is the presence of Teemu Pukki at the beginning.

In the encounter with Bosnia, the Finns played 5-3-2 with the following composition:

Joronen – Alho, Toivio, Arajuuri, Raitala, Hamalainen – Valakari (Schuller, 46), Kamara, Kauko (Sparv, 82) – Lod (Ostrobothnia, 77), Pukki

Most likely, this formation will remain the same in the meeting with Ukraine. In last year’s Nations League matches, Kanerva even managed to try 3-5-2, but it didn’t work out at all – 3 losses in three games. In the games with Poland and Wales at the end of last year, Finland was forced to reorganize to 4-4-2 and 4-4-1 more compact already in the course of the match, and the same Poles threw in “Suomi” three goals even before the break.

The 4-4-2 scheme against Andriy Shevchenko’s charges also has a right to exist. The same Minnesota United striker Robin Lod, who played second to Pukki in the game against the Bosnians, can play on the right flank of midfield in a system with two defenders.

The main star of the “owls” is undoubtedly Teemu pukki… The forward’s double in the meeting with the former Yugoslavs allowed him to get closer to Jari Litmanen in terms of number of goals for the national team – 29 against 32, so the record of the mythical predecessor of the Norwich striker may fall in the next fights, we hope not in the meeting with the blue-yellow team. Furthermore, Pukki made a decisive contribution to Finland’s entry into Euro 2020, in a word, a key player for Markku Kanerva.

Another forward state is Yoel pohjanpalo, a once very promising HIK player, acquired by Bayer Leverkusen in 2013, and now trying to salvage a Berlin Union career that went awry.

After returning from the lease to the Düsseldorf Fortune in 2016, Yoel managed to establish himself as an excellent “prankster”, but he couldn’t count on more in Leverkusen. In Union, he is only 17th in terms of the number of minutes played in the current season, which also does not add optimism to the player, but he is actively called up to the national team.

Pohjanpalo managed to upset Ukraine in the summer of 2017, however this did not help Finland to get at least a draw (1: 2).

The 21-year-old Brantford forward could be a potential attacking star in the future Marcus forss, so 30 games and 5 goals scored for the “bees” this season. In addition, Markus scored his debut goal for Suomi on a freight train with France in November last year, when Finland sensationally defeated the reigning world champions with a score of 2: 0. In the game with the “tricolor” Markku Kanerva managed to test many rotation players in action, who probably made a good impression with her game.

It is doubtful that a player will play against our team, but do not forget about the presence of such a player in the opponent’s squad.

Get out

The Finnish team is a pretty tough nut to crack, capable of causing problems for any opponent, in addition, it has grown remarkably in terms of play since the last meeting with Ukraine in June 2017, however, Suomi can and must win, which is what we want for our national team!

Roman Kotlyar, Football.ua

The Ukraine – Finland match will be held on March 28. The meeting is scheduled to start at 9:45 p.m. Kiev time. About him Football.ua it will happen Online text broadcast of the fight..