Ukraine heads for quarter-finals in debut at soccer's World Cup (07/02/06)

Ukraine heads for quarter-finals in debut at soccer's World Cup

by Matthew Dubas

PARSIPPANY, N.J. - In its debut World Cup performance, the Ukrainian soccer team has exceeded expectations, making it to the quarter-finals by defeating Switzerland on June 26.

The Group of 16 match held in Cologne, Germany, ended in the 2006 World Cup's first penalty kick shoot-out, with Ukraine scoring on three of its four shots and Switzerland succeeding on none. The Swiss went home after playing four games in the tournament without yielding a single goal.

Ukraine's road to the June 26 game began on a sour note, with Ukraine'sloss to Spain (4-0), but the Ukrainian team managed to overcome the setback and move on to the next round by defeating Saudi Arabia (4-0) and Tunisia (1-0).

Tension filled the air as the Ukrainians and Swiss battled it out in a scoreless 90-minute match. The game went back and forth with both teams keeping pressure on their respective goals and maintaining possession in the midfield. Only one yellow card was issued during this match, most likely due to the previous game between Portugal and the Netherlands, where 16 cards were given - four of them red cards.

But it was the excellent goaltending by Ukraine's Oleksander Shovkovskyi, the player of the match, that kept the team alive into the 30-minute overtime.

After uneventful regulation and overtime play - and as if the tension wasn't high enough - a penalty kick shoot-out determined who would move on to the quarter-finals.

Andriy Shevchenko shot first for Ukraine, with goaltender Pascal Zuberbuehler making an easy save for Switzerland. Shovkovskyi kept out the Swiss attempts on goal by Marco Streller, Ricardo Cabanas and Tranquillo Barnetta.

A chip shot by 21-year-old Artem Milevskiy put Ukraine ahead. Serhiy Rebrov put one in as well, and the third successful kick by Oleg Gusev solidified the victory for Ukraine.

According to the Interfax news agency, in a post-match interview, Ukraine's head coach, Oleg Blokhin, said, "I don't think that anyone believed in us. Most people had written us off, thinking that debutantes can't be competitive against experienced teams. Today we proved that we could play decent football. We play for results. We have fought so hard and come so far that it's all like a dream come true for us."

President Viktor Yushchenko, congratulated the team on the historic win saying, "The successful performances of the Ukrainian team are working to unite Ukraine and instill patriotism."

At press time, Ukraine was to face Italy in the quarter-finals on Friday, June 30, in Hamburg, Germany. The winner of that game will face the winner of the Germany-Argentina match in the semi-finals.

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