25,000 fans stayed behind at the grandstand of Maksimir Stadium in the capital of Croatia after the referee’s final whistle. The audience gave its favorite team a standing ovation. All the players also stood on the pitch, thanking the spectators for their vehement support during the game. Thus the supporters were saying good-bye to Dynamo Zagreb which... had just lost 0:2 to Dynamo Kyiv and were eliminated from the fixtures of the European Champions Cup. There were two feasts that evening. The first was celebrated by the champions of Ukraine who had successfully gone through the Champions League qualification round and the second by the champions of Croatia and thousands of their supporters who did their best. Both teams’ players had a good reason to feel joy. The Ukrainian club received another chance to challenge the title of Europe’s best club, while the Croatian one saw again that their loyal fans would never abandon their team. All this happened on Wednesday midnight. Yet, things began to unfold as follows...
IS THE LEAGUE A THING TO WORSHIP?
Dynamo Kyiv’s managers have never hidden that their team’s performance in the European Champions League is the No. 1 priority, which allowed many to reproach them for taking a slapdash attitude toward the national championship.
It so happened that Ukraine’s champions have played three matches over the past two weeks to packed stadiums. Before the culmination in Zagreb they had to play a national championship match in Zaporizhzhia and a 1/16 Ukraine Cup tie in Mykolayiv.
Metalurh Zaporizhzhia, which traditionally view matches with Dynamo Kyiv as the year’s central attraction, managed to cast a gloom on the champions: in the last minute of the game the metal workers scored an equalizer and thus tied the match, much to the delight of the 6,500 spectators who filled the local auto plant’s stadium to capacity. Another sensation could have erupted in Mykolayiv, where the local first-league side, supported by twenty thousand fans, almost opened the score in a cup tie against Dynamo. However, after conceding a goal, the host team lost heart, allowing the Kyivans to thrash them 6:0.
“Switching over to Europe” after the domestic battles, Dynamo Kyiv had ample grounds to worry. The 3:1 home win over Dynamo Zagreb was still not enough to make it through the next round. An ill-fated rebound of the ball, a mistake or two in the defense line could have decided the outcome. Incidentally, the stakes were high: besides becoming one of Europe’s 32 strongest clubs, a winning Dynamo could count on a $3 million UEFA bonus.
It is an open secret that all the Kyiv superclub’s internationals first of all dream of making a good show in the Champions League tournament and thus raise their transfer price. However hard Dynamo’s Brazilians, Rumanians, or Croatians might claim that every game for this prestigious club is important for them, it is crystal clear that all they look forward to is Europe!
The same is true about our audiences. Since Soviet times, Eurocup games have been a good chance for us to feel European at least for a few hours. This is why we still love them so much. Our public knows that there are no such things in Eurocup tournaments as “matches with prearranged results,” “sellouts of a coach by his players,” “pressuring the referee,” and other “niceties” of our nation’s soccer. This is why a Champions League match is a coveted spectacle for the audiences that will pack the stadiums usually half-empty during a domestic championship game. But the league is a hard nut to crack. Dynamo has done it for the seventh time in a row. Is it not time to get used to it? Still, all the fans become awestricken when their team is struggling to make it through to the Champions League.
WITH A FOREIGN SONG, TO VICTORY
It became clear even after the Kyiv game that the young Zagreb squad was unable to hold out for the entire match. Fatigue brings mistakes. As early as the first minute of the second half, a mistake allowed the visitors to counterattack, and Shatskykh sent the ball home after an accurate pass from Husev. The next forty minutes no longer mattered as far as tournament charts are concerned. With the two games’ aggregate score 4:1 in favor of Dynamo Kyiv, it was clear to all that the host team could not avoid elimination. Yet, although nobody believed that Dynamo Zagreb could manage to score three goals against the Ukrainians, the game became even more interesting. The hosts kept on attacking, while our boys put up a skillful defense and launched counterattacks. In the long run, the Kyivans’ higher class did the job. Picking the ball after a free kick, Diogo Rincon made the score 2:0 in favor of Dynamo Kyiv, and the outcome was clear.
What would have happened at a Ukrainian stadium in a similar situation? Probably the audience would have been leaving the grandstands, cursing like troopers, and the furious players would have been kicking the ball at random. Conversely, Zagreb’s Maksimir stadium got hotter with each passing minute. I don’t mean the plus thirty Celsius, I mean that the grandstands suddenly lit with torches, smoke grenades, and other pyrotechnics. The audience accompanied the salvos with equally loud songs and appeals to launch new attacks. As a Soviet period commentator would say, the final whistle sounded when the host team was attacking.
Zagreb Dynamo pushed themselves up to the final minute, and it is not the Croats’ fault that Dynamo Kyiv is stronger now. The Zagreb players left the pitch with heads held high amid the applause of spectators and their former partner Jerko Leko, now with Dynamo Kyiv. Our side left the field quietly. The Champions League tournament as such is still ahead.
