Andriy Shevchenko seemed destined to be filed alongside Alfredo Di Stefano, George Best and Ryan Giggs as one of international football’s best players to never appear at a tournament finals. The Ukrainian goal machine played in three consecutive play-off defeats but finally broke his country’s finals duck to reach the 2006 World Cup in Germany.
For a man whose net-finding exploits terrified European defences over more than a decade at Dynamo Kiev and Milan, Shevchenko’s talents had always deserved to shine in a major tournament. He got on the scoresheet with frightening regularity – top scoring with 10 goals in the unsuccessful attempt to reach the 2002 World Cup. In all, he scored 48 times in 111 caps for Ukraine.
When he did finally make it in 2006 – this time courtesy of a group win – the 2004 Ballon d’Or winner wasted no time to show what he was about. He scored his first World Cup goal in a 4-0 romp against Saudi Arabia and dispatched a 70th-minute penalty against Tunisia to send Ukraine into the knockout rounds.
Ukraine made it to the last eight, edging past Switzerland in a harrowing affair, even though their star striker missed his spot-kick in the 3-0 penalty shootout win. They lost to eventual winners Italy in the quarter-finals.
Shevchenko finally got to play in the Euros finals when Ukraine co-hosted the tournament with Poland in 2012. By then 35 and back at first club Dynamo Kiev, Sheva’s powers may have been on the wane, but he remained his country’s talisman. He scored two excellent headers in a come-from-behind win against Sweden, but defeats to group favourites France and England knocked the co-hosts out after three games.
Nine years on, Shevchenko is back again, this time leading Ukraine from the dugout, and he will have designs on leading his country even further. As if his country didn’t love him enough already.
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