We were moving to this the whole season

- Oleksandr, congrats on the championship! What do you feel at the moment?

- Thank you! It’s nice to win! We were moving to this the whole season, so, I suppose we’ve achieved our goal. The season was really difficult for our team because we had different lineups in nearly every game. It was hard to prepare the backbone of players since many guys had joined up the reserve team and the U19 side, so we had to compensate for their absence using the players from the U16 team. Therefore, today's victory is even twice as pleasant!

- How satisfied are you with the progress of the guys who took over the leaders’ roles after the latter moved to the teams of older ages?

- You know, I'm happy for them the most. Indeed, those who previously didn’t have any major roles have got their chance. I’m happy with the way they spent the season and with their progress.

- How would you comment on the final match - today you have surpassed Dynamo primarily mettle wise?

- Mettle wise as well. We have outplayed the opponents not only in this respect. Although the match began not in line with our plan at all, but there are objective reasons for that. Due to a sending-off in the semifinal, our major forward have not been able to play. Perhaps I was wrong in choosing the players for the final because in the first half we had issues, unfortunately we conceded a goal. We knew how Dynamo would operate, but we lacked pace while making transitions from defence to attack, so we are mainly talking about defenders. At half-time, we made adjustments, changed the principles, and the match began to develop in our favor. The guys managed to show character and equalize in the end - well done. This is what should be inherent in a team like Shakhtar! Although we could have scored in normal time and not bring it to a penalty shootout. In general, the encounter turned out to be exciting, perhaps I would like to see a better play, but I want to repeat that this season was really tough.

- The developments in the final precisely repeated the events in the semifinal match vs KZ Karpaty-Rukh. After the goal by Pushkaryov, did you know that the team would become champions?

- No, the goal did not make me feel relaxed enough to be confident of victory. I was more confident in our goalkeeper Barchenko. I know how Denys can and knows how to play in the penalty shootout, it's good that today he’s demonstrated this to the max. Barchenko is the leader and captain, he took a very active part in the victory. And the goal influenced the guys more: the positive emotions they got after it have helped us a lot.

- Denys Barchenko became the tournament’s best goalkeeper, and Anton Hluschenko received a prize as the player of the season. Are such achievements important to the team and the guys themselves?