ODESSA. Yesterday, at 13.08 (12.08 Italian time), an unprecedented page of football, political and military history was written at the Olympic Stadium in Kiev. After 180 days of suspension due to the war, the Ukrainian Premier League has resumed, the top national championship interrupted on February 24th. A first round with the first four games played yesterday behind closed doors and in stadiums in cities in the west of the country, or that portion of the territory furthest away from the live conflict. With an imperative indication: “In case of bombing the match is interrupted, players, technicians and referees will go to the air-raid shelters built no more than 500 meters from each stadium”.
A return to football that has an incisive meaning for a country hostage to a war that shows no signs of an imminent end. Even more so because the recovery comes on the eve of Independence Day, the mother of all Ukrainian patriotic celebrations, which this year experienced with terror due to possible attacks by Moscow. Yet the Kiev authorities had no doubts, bombs or not, the championship must resume, as if to exorcise the danger to recover remnants of normality, even showing disrespect towards the “bad guy” perched in the Kremlin. And what more predictable normality than football for a country that, in this, shows a strong European connotation.
It may be for this reason that the starting whistle of yesterday’s match in Kiev was a shrill sound for Moscow’s ears, also because it was Shakhtar Donetsk of former neroverde Roberto De Zerbi who played in the Ukrainian capital. That is the team of one of the cities in the hands of the pro-Russian since 2014, although the company has moved its headquarters and players to Lviv first and to Kiev later. Facing them were the eleven of the Metalist 1925 of Kharkiv, the city that suffered the first and most violent shock wave of the Moscow offensive and which is still under the bombing of Putin’s rockets. A match that on a political level would be unlikely, so much so that someone in the West spoke of the power of football diplomacy “capable of bringing together what men divide”.
«This is a unique initiative in history. Football against war in conditions of war. The football for peace, ”said Ukrainian football federation president Andriy Pavelko. “We are ready, we are strong and I think we will show the whole world the return to life in Ukraine and the will to win,” said Shakhtar captain Taras Stepanenko.
The news of the resumption of the championship was anticipated in July by the Minister of Youth and Sports Vadym Gutzait, who had revealed that he had found an agreement with the football association, the government and local administrations. «The matches – he said – will take place on the territory of Ukraine with the permission of the local military administrations and with the obligatory observance of the presence of representatives of the local military administrations, medical teams and emergency services. Safety first of all ».
Thus removed the hypothesis of holding cross-border matches (Poland had said it was available), at the moment the League will be played only in four regions: Kiev, Lviv, Transcarpathia and Ternopil, all located to the west.
However, the 16-team championship restarts without Desna Chernihiv and Mariupol, city teams that have suffered brutal destruction. All matches will be broadcast at home, abroad and on YouTube in an agreement with broadcaster Setanta agreed last week. The total value is $ 16.2 million over three years. Among the favorites remains Shakhtar who last season had been able to field the core of the formidable Brazilian players for which he became famous, thanks to the disbursements of the billionaire businessman Rinat Akhmetov owner, among other activities, of the Azovstal steel mill. After the illustrious defections this year, the club will rely on young Ukrainian talents ready to give prestige to the shirt as has already happened in the past. «Of course, it’s a new team – Stepanenko acknowledged -. We are confident because we play for our country and for our people ». By the way, the match in Kiev ended 0-0 with two yellow cards, but the atmosphere was “magical nights”.