Every year on April 29, our country celebrates All-Ukrainian Football Day. It was on this day 31 years ago that the national team played its first match in history as an independent state under the yellow-blue flag. Since then, our country has had many victories and pleasant stories in football. It is especially worth mentioning the incredible hosting of the home Euro in 2012 and the final of the Champions League in Kyiv in 2018; reaching the quarterfinals of the 2006 World Championship and the 2021 European Championship; the "golden" Dynamo Kyiv team of Valery Lobanovskyi, which crushed all rivals in the period 1997-99, the victory of Shakhtar Donetsk in the UEFA Cup in 2009, the Golden Ball to the best player in the world Andrii Shevchenko in 2004.
Therefore, our college decided not to deviate from the glorious traditions and the day before held its own mini-football championship, timed to the All-Ukrainian Football Day.
Despite the despicable rocket attacks on Uman and other cities that shook the entire country in the morning, we still managed to hold this tournament.
The war left its mark on the number of participants in the competition. Unfortunately, many college and university students continue to stay outside Kyiv. That is why 4 teams applied for the championship: Fsk-11/12, Fsk-21, Sk-31 and the university group I-21/22. The rules of the tournament provided for 6 meetings for one team, 2 matches with each opponent.
Already the first 2 rounds outlined the two main contenders for the championship, these are groups FSk-11/12 and FSk-21. After winning 2 matches each in the first matches, they met for the first time in the 2nd round. By the middle of the 2nd half, there was a very tight fight, no one wanted to concede in every episode. But the significant experience of the 3rd year performers, where the combination game performed by Ivan Abolin, Dmytro Krychenko and Artem Humenyuk, should be highlighted at the end of the meeting. The 2:0 victory defined the main favorite. Inspired by this result, in the future these gifted young men did not give anyone any chance. And, having won 6 out of 6 possible victories, they confidently climbed to the top of football glory.
Regarding the FC-21 group, they should be praised for the best balanced team composition. The team looked like a monolith, and every young man in it was one important link, without which the coordinated work of the entire mechanism is impossible. Unfortunately, the defeat in the 3rd round slightly broke the morale of the boys and sowed uncertainty. In the 2nd round, the team scored only 2 points, drawing twice and losing to the winner of the competition in the last match. As a result, the team took 8nd place with 2 points. By the way, this team was also at the game with their girl support group. The girls decided to spend their free time with benefit, so they enthusiastically supported their favorite team and inspired the players to actively fight.
Of course, it was very nice to see the Sk-31 group at the competition. These first-year students have not spent a single couple in college classrooms yet. Nevertheless, having a total of 8 young men in the group, they still assembled their team. And let there be only four of them, but in the process everyone gave 100%. Taking into account that all other teams are older in age, the addition of 7 points and the final 3rd place is a great result for such an ambitious team.
Undoubtedly, special mention should be made of the team of university students of groups I-21/22. After all, its members were not "athletes", but future software engineers. Great credit for the meeting goes to Danylyshyn Timur, the head of the group, who took responsibility for gathering the team to participate in the competition. Despite the fact that the first round turned out to be quite difficult in terms of playing (by the way, it should also be noted that many of them met each other for the first time in their lives) and scoring points, later this team began to add and even played once in a draw The head of the competition also decided to award the team with an honorary certificate for the 3rd place.
Summing up, I would like to note that the competition was held in a wonderful and pleasant atmosphere, and the students and fans had fun. And the best evidence of this is the words of the participants of the tournament: "And when will we have the next such competitions?"
And when you hear such a question, there is only one answer: "There will be! There will definitely be."
The main thing is that we should always remember that for conducting such competitions, for our peace, for faith in our free future, we should be indebted to the fallen soldiers of Ukraine and those who are protecting us now. Glory to Ukraine! The victory will definitely be ours!
