Oleksandr Kosenko: "Matches against Croatia are the most important for this year's national team"

18.02.2021 16:01

Photo by Pavlo Kubanov

The head coach of the Ukrainian national futsal team Oleksandr Kosenko announced the team's preparations for the Euro 2022 qualifiers against Croatia.

At the end of January, the blue and yellows started in the group stage of the European Championship qualifiers with an away victory over Albania (10:3). The Ukrainians have two matches ahead of them with Croatia, which will take place on March 3 and 7. On the eve of the next training camp, the head coach of the national team Oleksandr Kosenko talked to the press service of the Futsal Association of Ukraine.

— Alexander Petrovich, tell us when the national team of Ukraine will start preparing for the matches against Croatia.

- On February 28, the team will gather in Brovary. This and the next day we will hold one training session each. On March 2 we will go to Osijek, where on the 3rd we will have an away match. After that, the team will go to Zaporizhia, where they will prepare for the home match, which will take place on March 7 on the floor of the Palace of Sports "Youth".

— How do you assess the importance of the next two fights?

- Matches against the national team of Croatia in the group stage of the selection of Euro-2022 are key for our team. These two matches are the most important for the 2021 national team. It was considered so from the very beginning. The main goal of our team is to take the first place in their group. You need to go to the floor and achieve the desired result.

— In April, the national team of Ukraine will hold three matches in one go. What is your coaching opinion on this?

- Previously, the team always played in the format of mini-tournaments. We have a clip that consists of 25 performers. You can additionally call players for each match. So I see no reason to worry.