Spain looked to send Ukraine a Warning, but instead received Reality

May 28th, 2006 | by: Andriy Korol |

A few days ago, I had read an article where Luis Aragones was expressing his clear intentions of the Spain-Russia friendly.

Spain will be looking to send a warning to World Cup rivals Ukraine when they take on Russia in Saturday’s friendly in Albacete.

Spain coach Luis Aragones believes the clash will be crucial for his team’s preparations, bearing in mind their Group H opener against Ukraine on June 14 in Leipzig.

“This is the most important warm up game that we have because Russia is a very similar team to Ukraine and that is the reason we chose them,” Aragones said.

Well, if Ukraine is a ‘very similar team’ to Russia, then they have sent their message. “We cant find the net” was the message. But I thought it was funny this coach even made such a statement. Sure, Ukraine team is similar to Russia, exept that well…… Ukraine qualified for the World Cup and Russia didn’t? Ukraine finished at the top of a group that included Greece, Denmark and Turkey and Russia finished in 3rd and were unable to handle teams like Slovakia, Latvia, and Estonia and were absolutely crushed by Portugal 7-1.

If a message was sent, it was Ukraine that sent their message today by beating an actual World Cup participant Costa Rica 4-0 and just displaying their utter dominance. A team Ukraine that did not even consist of Shevchenko or Rebrov, with goals from Nazarenko,Vorobei,Kalynychenko and Bielik, proving that we do not really on Sheva to put the goals in the net.

Frankly, I love this coach Luis Aragones of Spain, I love reading his constant statements of cockiness, being so sure of his team that he’s already talking about whether or not his team will play Brazil in the Quarter Finals. A coach should not look that far ahead, he should take seriously his mission at hand, as Blokhin is doing. If team Spain keeps this up, it will be Ukraine and Tunisia proceeding to the Second Round, and if that happens, please don’t call it an ‘upset’.

But that’s just my opinion.

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Comments

By Ticos Hammered By Ukraine - FIFA World Cup 2006 - Ecuador World Cup Team Blog | May 28th, 2006 at 12:02 pm

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Posted from United States

By Raheel | May 28th, 2006 at 12:28 pm

From the match reports it seems the Spaniards struggled to break down a determined Russian team and that Torres was off-colour. While the match might have been a friendly , the weaknesses found(inability to score goals) could come back to haunt them at the WC. Ukraine , on the other hand , must be confident of their chances at the WC after a dominant, 4-0 win over Costa Rica. If Aragones could stop raving about playing Brasil , the Spaniards might still ail the illness which grips the Spain team at high-voltage matches.

Posted from India

By Sunday’s World Cup Friendlies Rewind - FIFA World Cup 2006 - World Cup 2006 Blog | May 28th, 2006 at 2:15 pm

[...] Ukraine 4 – Costa Rica 0 Despite coach Oleg Blokhin’s proclamations that his team is not fit and that his players are worthless slackers (I’m paraphrasing here), Ukraine still managed to put a hurting on Costa Rica. Four different players scored for Ukraine and none of them were named Andriy Shevchenko. Costa Rica did not mount much of an attack as it continues to prepare for a whipping by Germany on June 9. Any Ticos fans out there care to tell all of us why we can expect them to beat the host country on opening night? [...]

Posted from United States

By Bessam | May 28th, 2006 at 9:33 pm

HAHA that was the best title I have read in a long time.

Posted from United States

By rad|x | May 28th, 2006 at 11:05 pm

Being a ukrainian and having watched the Costa Rica friendly, I should probably mention that it wasn’t Ukraine who played well, rather Costa Rica played bad.

I also do not understand “Russia is a very similar team to Ukraine” comment.. a rather weird thing to say, considering how different both teams are, both coach/player wise.

But then again, why do I even complain, if Spain continues like this, its just going to be easier for Ukraine

Cheers.

By Andriy | May 29th, 2006 at 8:51 am

you’re correct, I couldnt actually catch the game but assumed Costa Rica played badly, they aren’t exactly World class material I suppose… but my point was just what you said, how is Russia similar to Ukraine ?

Posted from Canada

By tom | May 29th, 2006 at 11:21 am

Somewhere along the line, it might be interesting to see Coach Blokhin’s controversial statements addressed ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oleg_Blokhin ) I saw the original article. I have Polish in me and would well like to see Ukraine do well; but did not care for his remarks. I searched the archives and saw no mention of this incident.

Posted from United States

By Andriy | May 29th, 2006 at 12:18 pm

ya, lets leave that alone, this has not been varified by him, so it could just be senseless rumor that somebody started

Posted from United States

By Nolan | May 29th, 2006 at 2:30 pm

As stupid as Aragones can be, I trust that Villa will perform much better in the World Cup. Shevchenko is a mercenary who will lose to Spain in the world cup and lose to Barcelona in the Champion’s League once again.

Posted from United States

By jan | June 14th, 2006 at 4:16 pm

As a neutral fan, I was just watching the game between Spain and Ukraine.
It is so disappointing to conclude that the referee and the linesman totally lost control. They’ve made really bad decisions (all in favour of Spain)and just killed the match totally. Hopefully Massimo BUSACCA will receive what he deserves: never a World Cup match again.

Jan, The Netherlands

Posted from Netherlands