Defender of the Ukrainian national team: “This will be the match of our lives”

On March 26, the Ukrainian team will play the semi-final play-off match against the Swedish team in the World Cup qualifiers. Expectations from this confrontation in an exclusive interview with the site Spor.ua said the captain of our team Nikolay Matvienko.

“I think this is the strongest team we can get,” Matvienko said. – Right now everyone is focused on the situation of the Swedes. But our meeting will take place in two months. Everything can change. Sweden has a very strong squad and many of their players represent elite European clubs. They, like us, set the goal of getting to the World Championship, so a very tough challenge awaits us.

For me, the poor performance of the Swedes in the qualifying tournament means nothing. Every team can do their best in a match, even if it is an outsider, and Sweden is one of the strong European teams, that’s for sure.

For the Ukrainian national team, this will be a match of life, like all previous matches. After all, we understand that a war is going on in the country and every victory, even on the sports front, brings joy to Ukrainians in such a difficult period.