Preview

July 15, Kyiv, NSC Olimpiyskiy, 19:00

Before the match

This meeting has no competitive significance for the Miners, but it is still important in terms of the players’ form, interplay practice and team spirit. The early title did not put the footballers off duty in terms of their commitment to win every match, even more so as Luis Castro has been reshuffling the squad and giving everyone a valuable chance lately.

Mykola Matviienko, Marlos and Junior Moraes already vacationed and rejoined the team ranks. Currently, Andriy Pyatov, Sergii Kryvtsov and Taras Stepanenko have been on holiday. Yevhen Konoplyanka suffered an injury. The rest of players continue working in the usual mode, aiming toround off their league campaign with two straight games this week.

Opponents

Kolos, sitting in the 6th spot in the league table, will meet with Shakhtar and Dynamo in the final rounds, but their campaign will not be over yet. In a week’s time, on July 25, the Kovalivka-based side will have a knockout semi-final for a Europa League berth -this is UPL’s innovation. At that stage, the team of Ruslan Kostyshin will lock horns with Dnipro-1.

In the meantime, the Premier League newcomers, still being a team of mostly experienced players, are preparing to showcase their best qualities against the Champions. The Kovalivka team suffered a losing streak of 7 defeats that they interrupted by defeating Oleksandriya, still suffering further losses at the hands of Desna and Zorya.

Personnel news: the team are expecting Arnie Wilhelmsson to return after an injury, Oleh Ilyin also missed the recent games. Meanwhile, Pavlo Orekhovskyi already appeared as a sub in the second halvesvs Zorya and Shakhtar and may well be fielded again.

Head-to-head record

The Orange-and-Blacks beat Kolos thrice this season, but in the general course of events those encounters were strikingly different from each other (6-0, 4-3, 1-0).

Previous league meeting