'Ukraine Bullet' is gunning for glory

'Now, I'm off to play in Poland. The Poles have already qualified and so I hope that we too can pull off a qualification. I know it will be very, very hard to qualify via a play-off, probably against Germany, but I would really like to do it because it would be very important for all the people in my country."

The speaker is the "Ukraine Bullet", striker Andriy Shevchenko (photographed below) and his words explain just why, in cities as far away as Kiev and Minsk, they will be closely monitoring football events in Gelsenkirchen and Manchester next weekend.

As European football heads into a dramatic final D-Day of World Cup qualifiers, spare a thought for those small nations that stand on the brink of a first-ever appearance in the finals of soccer's most prestigious tournament.

For Irish fans, biting their nails and worrying about the result of games in Lisbon and Dublin, this is no new experience.

Ireland has already been there, at Italia '90 and USA'94. For football supporters in Kiev and Minsk, a World Cup qualification would represent something new, a moment of national pride in the otherwise difficult socio-economic turbulence of life in post-Soviet Ukraine and post-Soviet Belarus.

On a final weekend that sees many groups delicately balanced, Ukraine and Bielorussia are involved in a relatively straight-forward Group Five battle for second place behind the already qualified Poland.

If Ukraine beat Poland in Chorzow, then they are through. If Ukraine falter, then Belarus, just one point behind, could yet scrape through - providing they beat Wales in Cardiff.

And that's where Gelsenkirchen and Old Trafford come into the reckoning, since the runner-up in Group Five will meet either England or Germany in the play-offs for South Korea and Japan.

Neutrals are likely to be punting for Ukraine when it comes to next weekend and for one obvious reason - Shevchenko. Now 25 years of age, Shevchenko comes into a category that was once inhabited by such as Northern Ireland's George Best and more recently by Wales and Manchester United star, Ryan Giggs.

The category is that of an outstanding player destined by birth to play for a modest national team.

Ukraine fans would probably argue with the use of the adjective "modest". Built around the once splendid Dinamo Kiev, Ukraine's nine-year-old national team has twice narrowly missed out on the big time.

In the autumn of 1997, Ukraine made it to the play-offs for France'98, only to lose out to Croatia. Given that Croatia went on to go all the way to the semi-finals at France'98, that was perhaps no bad performance.

Two years later, Ukraine provided one of the big upsets of the play-offs for Euro 2000 when losing out to little Slovenia.

Modest is certainly not an adjective that can easily be used about Shevchenko or indeed about Ukraine's canny and highly experienced coach, Valeri Lobanovski.

Twice winner of the Cup Winners' Cup with Dinamo Kiev (1975, '86) and coach to a splendid USSR side that flattered only to disappoint at both the Mexico'86 World Cup finals and the Germany'88 European Championships, Lobanovski has long been acknowledged as an outstanding coach. One only wonders if the call to handle the national team in March two years ago has come just a little late in his career.

Whatever about Lobanovski, no one could suggest that the chance of a place in the World Cup finals has come too late in the career of Shevchenko.

In two seasons and a bit with AC Milan, he has shown himself to be amongst the very best, returning a stunning strike-rate of 68 goals in 100 official games.

Leading goalscorer in Serie A in his first year in Italy, Shevchenko has inevitably been the key figure in Ukraine's qualifying run, scoring six goals along the way.

Some indication of the responsibility that clearly sits on his modest shoulders next weekend can be gained from a glance at the squad named yesterday by Lobanovski for Saturday's crunch clash.

Shevchenko is one of only three players named who play their club football in Western Europe - Oleh Luzhny of Arsenal and Sergi Rebrov of Tottenham are the other two.

Lobanovski clearly hopes that Ukraine pride, plus a liberal dash of Dinamo Kiev organisation will do the job.

He knows all too well, however, that it may need the brilliance of Shevchenko to round off the whole business.

Over to Chorzow.