Today, September 3 in Poreč, Croatia, the Euro-2023 (U-19) indoor soccer tournament starts. The Ukrainian youth national team will begin its participation in the final round with a match against Italy.

The day before, the blue and yellow team trained in Spain and France. During this period, our team played three friendlies. In the first game, the Ukrainians unexpectedly defeated Spain (5:4), in the second they got their revenge on the Spaniards (2:5), and in the third they beat France (5:4).

At Euro-2023 (U-19) indoor soccer, Ukraine's youth national team will participate in Group B, where they will face Italy, Slovenia, and Finland. The match against the Italians will take place today (kickoff at 4:30 PM Kyiv time). All matches of the European Championship will be broadcast by "Suspilne Sport."

"Dmitry Ribitsky will miss the game against Italy due to an accumulation of yellow cards. As for Dmitry Fedik, I hope he will play against the Italians. And we also count on Ribitsky in the future. He received an injury in the match with the French. I think he will be fully ready soon. I hope Fedik will recover quickly as well."

"We went through training sessions practicing hidden passes to break Italy's defense. We already played against them at a tournament in Croatia and lost then — 2:7. It was hard for us to break the Italians' defense. This is tactically smart and experienced team. Back then, they didn't let us do much. Clearly, they prepared for us. So we tried to add some variety to our game,"— revealed head coach of the blue and yellow team Igor Moskvin.

Roster of Ukraine's youth national indoor soccer team for Euro-2023 (U-19)

Goalkeepers — Dmytro Dyachenko, Konstantin Rafałski (both — "Cardinal-Rivne"), Ivan Belyimov ("Black Sea"); field players — Vadym Tyutyrai, Maxim Malynovskyi, Dmytro Skychyk (all — "Cardinal-Rivne"), Illia Prykhodko, Dmytro Fedik (both — "Hurricane"), Denis Snitsarenko ("SkyUp Futsal"), Dmytro Ribitsky ("FutSal Szczecin," Poland), Andriy Yelishev, Vladyslav Tkachenko (both — "Red Devils," Poland), Igor Pelецкий ("Vikingay," Lithuania), Roman Tatumiak ("United Pomiecie," Italy).

As a reminder, the host Croatia team was joined by seven winners of the main round. Eight participants were divided into two groups of four teams each, with the top two from each group advancing to the semifinals.

Euro-2023 (U-19) indoor soccer final tournament

Group A: Croatia, Portugal, Spain, France.

Group B: Ukraine, Finland, Slovenia, Italy.

Schedule

03.09.2023

Finland — Slovenia (14:00)

Ukraine — Italy (16:30)

Portugal — Spain (19:00)

Croatia — France (21:30)

04.09.2023

Slovenia — Ukraine (14:00)

Italy — Finland (16:30)

France — Portugal (19:00)

Spain — Croatia (21:30)

06.09.2023

Ukraine — Finland (14:00)

Slovenia — Italy (16:30)

Spain — France (19:00)

Croatia — Portugal (21:30)

08.09.2023

Semifinal 1 (18:30 or 21:30)

Semifinal 2 (18:30 or 21:30)

10.09.2023

Final (21:30)

Match times are in Kyiv time.

As a reminder, Ukraine's youth national indoor soccer team qualified for the final tournament of the continental championship for the third consecutive year. In Group 2 of the main round of Euro-2023 (U-19) qualification, which was held in Vrnjačka Banja, Serbia, Igor Moskvin's wards confidently defeated Montenegro (12:1) and Romania (7:3), lost to Serbia in the decisive match (4:2), thus securing first place in the group.

Euro-2023 (U-19) indoor soccer. Qualification main round, Group 2

22.03.2023

Ukraine — Montenegro — 12:1

Romania — Serbia — 1:6

23.03.2023

Romania — Ukraine — 3:7

Serbia — Montenegro — 3:1

25.03.2023

Serbia — Ukraine — 2:4 

Montenegro — Romania — 2:7 

Final standings

The inaugural European Championship for youth indoor soccer was held in 2019 in Rijeka, and the second edition took place in Hain in 2022 — both times (2019, 2022) Spain's team emerged as champions. The second championship was initially scheduled for 2021 but was postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Ukraine's national team participated in both final tournaments. In 2019, Vitaliy Odegov's wards secured third place in their group, and in 2022 they were eliminated in the semifinals.