Two weeks ago the probability of Kyiv Dynamo qualifying for the Champions League quarterfinals seemed like the chance for a tossed coin to land standing on its edge. The chance of the Kyivans’ victory in all the remaining matches was not even discussed as pure fantasy. Now, half the deed has been done.
Soccer is magically attractive because it is unpredictable. No matter what pundits say about the aggregate technical and tactical actions and how convincingly coaches explain the causes of wins and losses, everything can happen when the ball is in play. So the pundits keep their fingers crossed, forgetting their theories, and Dynamo’s second, third, fourth, and fifth coaches smoke unmercifully next to their daddy, while the latter, Valery Lobanovsky, sits swinging from side to side, for he never learned to run out theatrically on to the pitch and pose in front of the cameras.
The artificially heated pitch at Tronheim Stadium was very soft and required careful handling of the ball which seemed to be sinking into the surface together with the player’s foot instead of bouncing off. The players’ legs, warmed up by masseurs, wouldn’t do in the most crucial moments the moves they had learned back in childhood.
The first twenty minutes of the Rosenborg vs. Dynamo game bore little resemblance to soccer. The Ukrainian team’s defense, reshuffled for the umpteenth time, allowed the hosts to do what they pleased in those minutes near Shovkovsky’s goal. “Whatever you want, but not this!” our goalie would note, making a save almost every minute after a mistake by the unbalanced defense line. Yet, something hampered the Norwegians from opening the score: either fullback Fedorov who clung doggedly to center forward Carew without letting go of him to the end, or self- assertiveness had panicked the Norwegians near the Kyiv goal in the last minutes of the previous match. What our side had to do was to execute the highest soccer justice. For an unwritten law says that if you don’t score, they will.
Serhiy Rebrov was expected to be able to work wonders on the pitch a few years ago, when his unbelievable shots would save Dynamo and the national team in critical moments. It would take about five paragraphs to enumerate the decisive goals Serhiy scored out of nowhere, so I refer the readers to Rebrov’s superb goal against Rosenborg on February 29. On International Women’s Day, about the existence of which the Norwegians have not the faintest idea, our forward continued his series of miracle goals. But it would be unfair to say that all the credit should only go to player number 11. While the Dynamo defense always remained like a sieve that evening, Lobanovsky’s team completely outdid the host team on the middle line and the attack. And even the goal Berg scored in the scramble from under Nesmachny’s feet did not change the spirit. In the center, Dynamo were head and shoulders above their foes. One tired Jacobsen was not sufficient to outplay the quick Kaladze, Belkevych, Husin, and Khatskevytch.
Something prompted us to think in the early second half that the surprisingly talented Demetradze would not score and the no-less-gifted Shovkovsky would not concede a goal. The five potential goals our Georgian failed to score were offset by the five convincing saves the Dynamo goalie made. In other words, our goalkeeper was impenetrable. And what was enough for the so coveted a victory was Rebrov who put the right spin on the ball at the right moment (by the way, Rosenborg last lost a home match, 0:1, in 1996 to Porto).
We can now vividly recall long-ago 1965, when Dynamo also beat Rosenborg twice, as well as the recent 1999. It is last year that Dynamo won unexpectedly the match versus Madrid Real. Next week, the Kyivans will have to repeat that achievement to make it to the Champions League quarterfinals. Will the coin of destiny again land standing on edge, which we need so badly?
