Ukraine Soccer Team

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General Information
Country - Ukraine
Capital City - Kiev
Continent - Europe
Manager - Oleg Blokhin

Team History
Founded 1991
Affiliated 1992
WC participations NONE
WC honours NONE
Continental Titles NONE

World Cup Record:
Year Host Performance
1930 Uruguay -
1934 Italy -
1938 France -
1950 Brazil -
1954 Switzerland -
1958 Sweden -
1962 Chile -
1966 England -
1970 Mexico -
1974 West Germany -
1978 Argentina -
1982 Spain -
1986 Mexico -
1990 Italy -
1994 U.S.A. -
1998 France -
2002 S.Korea/Japan -
2006 Germany in Group H with Spain, Tunisia, Saudi Arabia
UKRAINE Football Team for 2006 FIFA World Cup

Coach:
Oleg Blokhin

Goalkeepers:
Oleksandr Shovkovskiy, Andriy Pyatov, Bogdan Shust.

Defenders:
Andriy Nesmachniy, Serhiy Fedorov, Vladimir Yezerskiy, Andriy Rusol, Dmytro Chigrynskiy, Vladislav Vashchuk, Vyacheslav Sviderskiy.

Midfielders:
Anatoliy Tymoschuk, Oleg Shelayev, Oleg Gusev, Serhiy Rebrov, Andriy Gusin, Serhiy Nazarenko, Maksim Kalinichenko, Ruslan Rotan.

Forwards:
Andriy Shevchenko, Andriy Voronin, Artem Milevskiy, Andriy Vorobey, Oleksiy Byelik.

Ukraine Statistics Participating for the First time in the World Cup Finalsin Group H with Spain, Tunisia, Saudi Arabia

Jersey No. Name of the Player
1 Oleksandr Shovkovskiy
2 Andriy Nesmachniy
3 Serhiy Fedorov
4 Anatoliy Tymoschuk
5 Vladimir Yezerskiy
6 Andriy Rusol
7 Andriy Shevchenko
8 Oleg Shelayev
9 Oleg Gusev
10 Andriy Voronin
11 Serhiy Rebrov
12 Andriy Pyatov
13 Dmytro Chigrynskiy
14 Andriy Gusin
15 Artem Milevskiy
16 Andriy Vorobey
17 Vladislav Vashchuk
18 Serhiy Nazarenko
19 Maksim Kalinichenko
20 Oleksiy Byelik
21 Ruslan Rotan
22 Vyacheslav Sviderskiy
23 Bogdan Shust

Ukraine is playing in Group H along with Spain, Tunisia and Saudi Arabia. This FIFA season it's a big opportunity for Ukraine as the team is going to play its first FIFA World Cup.

Ukraine had almost made it to the World Cup twice. After the break-up of Soviet Union in 1991 the Football Federation of Ukraine was formed. Then the Ukraine national team entered a preliminary stage for FIFA World Cup finals in 1996/97 for the France 1998 World Cup. They secured second place in their group behind Germany. They were placed before Portugal and Northern Ireland. But they lost to Croatia in the play-offs and could not make it to France.

Similarly before South Korea/Japan 2002 they went down to play-offs with Germany.

As the team could not qualify for the UEFA EURO 2004, 1975 European Footballer of the Year, Oleg Blokhin joined in place of Leonid Buryak as the coach. He successfully led the East Europeans to a place in the finals at Germany.

Captain Andriy Shevchenko is the star player of the team. He is a world-class striker who was awarded the 2004 European Footballer of the Year award. Ukraine's fortunes depend on this player. Andriy Vorobey and Andrey Voronin along with Andriy Shevchenko form a deadly attacking line.

After the host Germany, Ukraine was the first European team to qualify for Germany 2006 on 03rd Sep 2005 when they had 24 points and the second placed team, Turkey was 7 points behind at 17 points and both had 2 matches still to play. Ukraine topped its Group with 7 wins, 4 draws and 1 lost match. Its only loss was to Turkey. The fans are hopeful that Ukraine will put up a great performance at FIFA World Cup 2006 in Germany.