Preview

March 4th, Kharkiv, OSK Metalist, 19:00
Live broadcast on Futbol 1 TV channel

Before the match

On March 1st, Vorskla interrupted Shakhtar's long-lasting unbeaten run in the league (48 games) which had lasted since August 2018. However, this did not affect the standings significantly: the Miners are 14 points clear of Dynamo and now 13 points ahead of Zorya.

A few players who had more match practice got a day off on Sunday. For the first time in 2020, Maycon appeared for 90 minutes for the club. We also want to mention the debut of the Academy graduate Artem Bondarenko who played in the second half, along with Fernando’s late appearance.

If you want to support the Orange-and-Blacks at the stadium, purchase tickets for the encounter with Dnipro-1 online at shakhtar.com and at the OSK Metalist ticket office. Also, they have been selling season tickets for every home game of the UPL second stage and tickets for the Europa League Round of 16 game Shakhtar vs Wolfsburg (March 19).

Opponents

Dnipro-1 are going to Khariv, sitting in the 8th spot after having claimed as many points as Mariupol (22). In the autumn, Dmytro Mykhailenko’s men had a series of five defeats, which they managed to interrupt with a draw vs Desna. Later, they defeated Vorskla and Lviv, however, before leaving for holidays, the Dnipro outfit lost 0-4 to Kolos and 1-2 to Oleksandriia.

Currently, the team are in a good mental form. The reason behind that is their previous round victory over Dynamo Kyiv. The silver medalists of the last three leagues scored a goal just before half-time (Benjamin Verbic scored from the spot) and continued leading for a long time after the break, but everything changed after the sub appearance of Vladyslav Supryaha who scored a hat-trick after the 71st minute, making it 3-1. The only negative echo of that match is the suspension of Volodymyr Polevyi - he was went off at 1-1.

Head-to-head record

The opponents have met only twice: in the 2018/19 Ukrainian Cup semi-final and at the first stage of the current league season. On both occasions, the matches ended 2-0 in favour of Shakhtar. The goals were scored by Dentinho, Marcos Antonio, Junior Moraes, and Taison, with three of the four goals being netted after the 80th minute.