Travel Diary: Saturday, November 13th, 1999 - Ljubljana, Slovenia

As the clock struck midnight to mark the beginning of another matchday, I was enjoying a hefe weiszen at the Ukrainian club in Munich of all places. Some friends and I had flown there from London earlier in the evening to meet up with our German friends before driving, via Austria, to Slovenia and Ljubljana. The atmosphere was festive, as it always is when friends meet and as the beers flowed, so did the songs. A quick meal-stop later at a friend's flat and we were on our way.

We'd decorated our hired minivan for the trip, with a Ukrainian flag in one back window and a pirate's skull & crossbones in the other. We were out to raid Ljubljana and plunder three points!

Singing at Internat in Munich

As dawn broke over the Austrian Tirols we were all privileged to see one of the most impressive sights in the world. The first snows had already fallen at altitude and the snow-capped mountains were majestic in the crystal-clear alpine air. Soon we would be in Slovenia.

Upon arrival we checked into our hotel and went about our business until noontime when we all began to get ready for the big match. The hotel staff had wisely given us a floor to ourselves and we were soon singing away in the corridor, as we got dressed for the occasion.

Once out in the hotel courtyard, Jaegermeister, beer and horilka flowed, as did the singing. We must have been quite a spectacle as considerable numbers of the locals came out of their flats to watch from the balconies, some even taking pictures of us. Not just locals though. A Ukrainian-American from Detroit also heard us and came down to join us. He brought along some of the banners he and his wife had made, one a play on a Beatles tune; "Those Ukraine boys really knock me out!"

Pirate wagon

We soon began the march toward the stadium, a baker's dozen of us on parade, eventually stopping for a bite to eat at a local restaurant. As we stopped by, we passed a few hard looking lads at a bar around the corner drinking some bottles of local wine & beer. While they were quite nice and welcoming, we were never quite sure things would stay that way and they were a little provocative when we walked past them later. Luckily nothing came of it. As we approached the stadium, we found our gate and one of our lot went to pick up our tickets. In the meantime, we met up with those who'd travelled from Ukraine and elsewhere to attend. This being the seventh Ukraine game I've attended, quite a few of the faces amongst the regulars are becoming a little familiar!

The stadium in Ljubljana leaves rather a lot to be desired, but it did have a bar selling shandys and enough portaloos to cover so it could have been worse. The bowl of the seats is essentially below surface and there is a flat grass terrace on top where we stood, capacity probably about 20,000. The pitch looked rough and heavy and had the appearance of not having been mowed in a long time. Home-field advantage indeed!

The players entered the pitch from underneath a set of Roman columns off the end of the pitch that doubles as a hand-operated scoreboard. Fenway Park, eat your heart out. As they walked onto the pitch, people standng on top of the columns threw loads of confetti over the edge in the colours of the Slovenian flag and music blared out of the stadium speakers. The Ukrainian players turned to face the flag and we sang the anthem. We were a bit slower than the music however and were still singing fter it finished. After the Slovenian anthem, the whistle blew and it was game on.

Up in the Austrian alps

Oleh Luzhny's injury meant newcomer Dmytro Parfyonov of Spartak Moscow lined up at right back. Another debutant was Serhyj Kandaurov of Benfica in the midfield, replacing injured Yuri Maximov. Otherwise the team was fairly straightforward.

The first minutes were a bit frenetic but soon Ukraine gained some semblance of control and on the half hour, a throw in by Kosovsky found Shevchenko, whose nice pass sent Kandaurov into the corner. A crafty backheel gave the ball back to Shevchenko just outside the corner of the area. Dancing past his defender he brought the ball six feet inside the breadth of the area before unleashing a fierce, curling drive into the top left corner of the Slovenian net! 0-1! A bunch of us on the terrace, jumping up and down in a group hug, began dancing in a circle chanting "Ukrajina!" Euphoric, images of Belgium danced before our eyes and we began dreaming of our coming summer holidays in the Benelux!

Things calmed down after the goal though, our boys didn't seem to run with as much vigour and slowly you could see things looking just a little bit pear-shaped.

Come halftime, in between appearances in front of various Ukrainian television cameras, I popped over to the injured players and asked Oleh for a photo. I told him to look out for a Ukrainian flag when the Arsenal come to Coventry on Boxing Day as we hope to be there to give him a cheer.

The hotel party

The second half began not so well. We were not the same team and the Slovenians were pressing with a lot of physical play. The referee was a waste of space and kept denying Ukrainian claims to fouls, even obvious ones. And then a major defensive error led to trouble.

Kosovsky mishandled a Slovenian throw-in towards the goal allowing the ball to run under his foot. Of all the people on the pitch to let it run to, you didn't want it to be Zlatko Zahovic, but to him it fell. One touch and his powerful right-footed drive from the edge of the "D" beat Shovkovsky to his right and flew into the net, about a foot inside the post. 1-1.

The goal seemed to spur Ukraine, but their urgency didn't seem well directed and soon led to greif when Parfyonov saw his debut match for Ukraine end ignominiously with a second yellow card and a red. Down to ten men, it became a bit of a salvage operation and a draw at that point would not have been a very bad result given the away goal already in hand.

The game settled for the most part and then...self-inflicted disaster.

Shovkovsky took a free kick out near the touchline, but mis-hit it and it only flew about 30 metres. Acimove intercepted the ball about ten metres inside the Ukrainian half. SaSho was stranded. The Slovenian then let fly with a 50 metre strike. Immediately, when you see something like this, you instinctively do mental calculations because it takes so long for the ball to make it's flight. This looked bad. An as SaSho ran back to the net, the ball landed dead on the goal line, two-feet inside the left post, the Ukrainian keeper diving desperately to reach it. As the ball bounced into the roof of the net, SaSho himself rolled in as well and suddenly were were down. 2-1.

Goradz & friends after the match

With only six minutes plus injury time remaining, there was little or nothing left to give, and a thoroughly disastrous match was rounded out by Husyn getting himself sent off three minutes from time. We were a spent force and the whistle came that no Ukrainian supporter wanted to hear at that moment. On the face of it though, not all was lost. We had the all-important away goal and a 1-0 result in Kyiv would see us through to Belgium.

The Slovenian police quite unpolitely ushered us out of the stadium within minutes of the end of the match. It was, quite frankly, the worst policing I've ever witnessed on my travels. We then began the long walk back to the hotel. Unfortunately, I got distracted and then stopped at a stoplight and in the process lost my travelling mates. In looking for them, I ended up talking with some Slovenian lads and when it was clear I wasn't going to find my friends, went out with them for a drink.

The first bar we went to was closed but nearby was another one. We went in and tried some Smile, their local version of Mexico's Corona cerveza. There was plently of light-hearted banter with the locals, as I stuck out like a sort thumb in my vyshyttia and with my Ukraine scarf and flag draped over my shoulders. And then the DJ started playing a rock'n'roll version of the Slovenian national anthem. The bar exploded into a madhouse, people dancing on the tables and Slovenian flags flying everywhere. If you can't beat 'em, join 'em, so I got my Ukraine flag out and danced with them. As midnight tolled, we toasted each other and laughed at Goradz's lucky wheel.

Quite late I finally made it back to the hotel to catch at least a couple of hours of sleep for the drive back to Munich. By noon the next day we would be back in the gorgeous Austrian Alps, washing down our kovbasa with horilka and beer and singing the old songs.

But would we still be singing on Wednesday?

The Final Group Table:

What happened next...

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