For the first time since February 24 and the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, a Ukrainian football team officially played again. On Thursday, Dynamo Kyiv U19 team faced Sporting Portugal in the round of 16 of the youth league, the Youth Champions League. Kyiv lost 2-1. The match was moved to Bucharest, the Romanian capital, a few hours’ drive from the Ukrainian border.
Two thousand fans, including professional Dynamo captain and Ukraine international Sergei Sidorchuk, attended the match, which was necessarily rich in symbols. Dinamo players have been in Bucharest for several days. Gigi Becali, President of Steaua Bucharest, hosts and feeds more than 200 Ukrainians in all of the city’s club and hotel facilities.
This is how 38 players and members of the Dynamo Kyiv U19 team got the help of the Romanian businessman and politician for about a week. Undoubtedly his head elsewhere, the Ukrainian youth lost the match against Sporting. The Portuguese won thanks to striker Diogo Cabral’s double, and will meet another Portuguese club, Benfica, in the quarter-finals.
