From The Vault: Lobanovskyi’s first step towards the 1999 semi-final
Eight teams Soviet Top League champions. Six times Soviet Cup champions. 1975 and 1986 Cup winners’ Cup. The first soviet side to win a European trophy. Valeriy Lobanovskyi’s Dynamo Kyiv sculpt their name in the history books.
Love was lost in the beginning of the 1990s as Lobanovskyi headed to the middle east for a period with the United Arab of Emirates and Kuwait national teams. Coincidentally, it was the time of the fall of the Soviet Union.
People weren’t interested in football after that. There was no money. The footballing structure fell apart with the falling of the Union. Calling it Sunday League would be giving it favor.
Then, the violinist returned as portrayed in the “Lobanovskiy Forever” movie. He sat down and started playing, again. Lobanovskyi’s Dynamo Kyiv are still the last team from eastern Europe to reach the Champions League semi-final. A feat they achieved after bypassing the then seven times European champion and cup holder, Real Madrid.
Real Madrid had kept all of their stars from the winning side of 1998. The only major absentee was the manager, Jupp Heynckes. Guss Hiddink was leading the Spanish side after that in the 1998–99 season. Eventually, leaving in February and John Toshack — previously Real Madrid manager in the 1989–90 season — taking over.
The first leg at the Santiago Bernabeau enabled Dynamo Kyiv to reach the semi-final. Real Madrid’s 4–2–3–1 saw Predrag Mijatovic starting on the left wing but positioning himself narrowly and moving inside. The aim was to keep Dynamo’s right side busy with Robert Carlos as Mijatovic overloads the center.
For Dynamo Kyiv it was the constant shape they played throughout the competition 1–3–3–1–2, but in this game it was more of a 4–3–1–2 as Oleksandr Holovko was positioned deeper than usual aiding his sweeper Vladyslav Vashchuk.
Normal operations for Dynamo would see Vitaliy Kosovskyi, wider than his teammates on the left. Basically stretching the diamond. The player on the right side of the diamond would keep his role centrally, and occasionally drifting to the right to help Oleh Luzhny. On the day that player was Alyaksandr Khatskevich.
Khatskevich had a different role this time, leaving Luzhny against Roberto Carlos — albeit not alone as Serhiy Rebrov regularly dropped back to support. Rather than drifting to the right, he dropped deeper to protect the right channel and central area against Mijatovic’s drifts inside.
Sometimes Carlos didn’t make an action fast enough, allowing Khatskevich to pounce — leaving Mijatovic — and collecting the ball.
Khatskevich’s deeper role also allowed him to cover for Andriy Husin. The latter had to face Mijatovic here near the center of the pitch, freeing Raul. The freedom didn’t last as Khatskevich got close to Raul.
It paid off when Fernando Morientes dragged both Vashchuk and Holovko out of position and slipped a pass to Raul. Khatskevich’s deeper positioning meant that we was first to the ball, preventing Raul from a clear goal scoring opportunity.
Mijatovic wasn’t concerned with width as he nearly operated as a 2nd number 10 next to Raul. Once Khatskevich felt that he was wide due to his normal positioning in the diamond, he checked for Mijatovic and got narrower.
Being narrower decreased Mijatovic’s options. For example, if Khatskevich wasn’t positioned in-front of Mijatovic here, the Montenegrin would have had space because Raul’s run forward dragged Husin to the edge of the box.
Khatskevich followed Mijatovic whenever the Real Madrid player was trying to exploit the spaces behind the Dynamo Kyiv defenders.
Had Khatskevich not been there, Mijatovic would have run into the box uninterrupted. Instead, the pressure meant that the ball was out for a Dynamo Kyiv goal-kick.
The deeper positioning allowed Khatskevich to support Holovko and Vashchuk in clearing cross-field balls as well.
After Real Madrid introduced Savio in place of Clarence Seedorf, they moved Raul to the right and Mijatovic tothe center. Allowing all three of Savio, Raul and Mijatovic to attack narrower. It was same old for Khatskevich, dropping this time to help Husin.
The utilization of Khatskevich deeper than usual to protect the center and right channel decreased Real Madrid’s threat. Shevchenko’s opener was cancelled out by Mijatovic’s free-kick meaning that the game ended 1–1 at the Bernabeau, a decent scoreline for Lobanovskyi’s side.
Valeriy Lobanovskyi’s Dynamo Kyiv are still the last team from behind the Iron Curtain to reach the Champions League’s semi-final. Will there ever be a second-coming ?
