Match preview

October 17, Kyiv, NSC Olimpiyskiy, 17:00

Behind closed doors

Before the match

The Ukrainian Championship will resume after the second rather long break, although only 5 rounds are over now. Shakhtar are still in the 4th spot as they drew on three occasions (vs Zorya, Rukh and Desna). Luis Castro's men scored goals in all of them, securing just one clean sheet - on September 27 vs Olimpik (2-0).

The coronavirus has been the main topic of recent weeks again. Initially, captain Andriy Pyatov and vice-captain Taras Stepanenko dropped out of the working process at Shakhtar. Later, another 9 players tested positive. The team were preparing for the match against Lviv without them. Only a few days before the match, Luis Castro had the opportunity to conduct full-fledged training sessions and small-sided games with the number of outfield players reaching 17. This was possible after the arrival of the internationals, the recovery of Bolbat and Vakula, and also thanks to involving the U21 players Mampassi, Shostak, Honcharuk and Churko who returned to Shakhtar just recently.

The Miners defeated Lviv in 4 previous matches with different scores: 5-0, 3-0, 2-0 and 4-1. Marlos, Dentinho, Bolbat and Patrick each scored two goals against these opponents, plus Moraes grabbed a hat-trick in the last meeting.

Opponents

Having played only 4 matches, Lviv are sitting bottom of the table. Our opponents earned the only point in the previous round vs another Lviv-based club of Rukh. They are neighbours not just location wise, but also in terms of their current standing.

The team headed by a 46-year-old Georgian Georgy Tsetsadze started the current league campaign with 3 games vs the country's representatives in European competitions. Lviv suffered major defeats at the hands of Kolos and Zorya (0-4 and 0-5), also defeating Dynamo (1-3). The Croatian Maks Celic has scored the only goal, alongside 12 goals conceded. To strengthen the attacking third, the club signed Ernest Antwi in October. In the past round, the Ghanaian spent 90 minutes on the Rukh's bench in the game against Lviv, joining the latter as a free agent after terminating the contract with the former.

We want to add that on Thursday evening, two Lviv players tested positive for the coronavirus. They were isolated from the team who went to Kyiv for the match vs Shakhtar.

Head-to-head record

Shakhtar won 6 times, with Lviv having a draw and a win. The goal difference is 18-3.

Previous meeting

The teams met most recently nearly a year ago - on November 22, 2019. Shakhtar won 4-1, although the first half ended in a 1-1 draw - Lviv responded with a goal by Tatarkov to Moraes' accurate shot finishing Bolbat's cross. Tete had some excellent scoring opportunities, with some of his attempts going wide and some being saved by Bandura. There were other heroes that night: in the second half, Moraes finished off Ismaily's assist, then he also converted a spot-kick, with Alan Patrick sealing the win – 4-1.