Mladen Bartulovich: "I want to congratulate my team on a well-deserved and confident victory"

Flash comment from head coach of "Metalist 1925" Mladen Bartulovich on "UPL TV" after his team's victorious match against "Poltava":

— First of all, I want to congratulate my team on a well-deserved and confident victory. A bit of nerves was added by our goal being disallowed in the second minute. It's a pity, because we had been working on that moment throughout the week: the play went well, we scored a goal, but it was disallowed. This added some nervousness. But we had many opportunities afterwards, and we managed to score a very important goal. In the second half, we were able to score a second goal — we would have liked it to happen a bit earlier so we could "close" the match. But overall, we are very satisfied — both with the game and the victory.

— How did you find a way to score goals, as the team looked more confident in the second half?

— We analyzed the opponent very well, knew the specifics of their game — they act one-on-one. So we created appropriate situations for our attacking players, who acted actively and created chances.

— Pavlyuk was able to turn the tide of the match today. Can he be called the best player of the match?

— Today we focused on set pieces, because we understood that the field could be difficult, and the opponent was tough. We managed to score from a set piece — we worked on that. Pavlyuk did well, played well both in defense and attack.

— You have two strikers — Itodo and Mba, who fight well for the ball. How do you choose between them?

— They work, there is competition between them for a place on the field. Although they are friends, they communicate well with each other. We take into account the specifics of the opponent and choose the one who fits better for the specific game.

— Moura left the field due to injury. Is there already an understanding of what happened to him?

— Yes, he got injured. We don't know yet what exactly happened, but we hope everything will be fine. Because for the second match in a row, our players are getting injured — and we don't want this trend to continue.