Phoenix and the second team of Master of Ball played their seventh head-to-head game against each other, and although complete advantage in the history of this struggle is on our side (6 victories and one draw), at least in half of these encounters it wasn’t easy for the boys to get their victory. It’s enough to remember the game of Kharkiv Cup last year when Phoenix escaped defeat only two minutes before the final whistle thanks to goal scored by Hlib Ivaniuzhenko.

And today till the middle of the first half Phoenix could only benefit from relative territorial advantage. The opponent responded with its attacks to ours, at the same time letting their goalkeeper support them over and over again. Dmytro Shchokin took several aimed shots at Volodymyr Lazeba’s net, but our goalkeeper was playing reliably.

Master of Ball was playing very tightly, trying not to yield in physical struggle and pace. However, the orange team did not always manage to do it according to rules, especially when our boys shifted from the flanks into the center. In the third minute Ivan Konkov was knocked down by his namesake – Ivan Havrilov. Fortunately, it all ended without injuries for the former and by a yellow card for the latter.

‘The ice was broken’ when the first four-players set which kept a long possession of the ball but did not escalate the attack was changed by the second one. Pace increased and almost at once Demyd Yevsiukov, and then Olexandr Bezruk scored twice within one minute.

We need to give a credit to our opponents – the Masters did not give up and made comeback in one minute only – an inaccurate pass in the attack led to one-on-one breakaway. Volodymyr Lazeba managed to clear the first shot, but our defendants were not quick enough to prevent Mykhailo Vyalin kick the ball into the empty net. Phoenix succeeded in restoring status quo in three minutes – a goal was scored by Nikita Bodnar who is building up with every coming game.

Then the first four-player set woke up, too. Even before the break Ivan Konkov and Mykhailo Soldatenko brought the score to quite comfortable 5:1.

The second half of the game passed with complete advantage of our team. Coaches received opportunity to experiment with composition of four-player sets, and there were more opportunities to score. Keeper Maksym Dolhulia was unfortunate – he had at least two one-hundred percent chances to score, but luck did not hold.

Phoenix play itself looked very attractive. The team showed good pace, movement, cross passes and beautiful combinations. The boys celebrated goals three times in the second half – Artem Shevchenko used a mistake of the opponents’ goalkeeper who joined the attack, and one goal each was scored by Mykhailo Soldatenko and Demyd Yevsiukov, who is, by the way, the best Phoenix scorer in this Cup with seven goals scored.

Phoenix returned to the first line in the tournament table having the same number of goals with Sokil, but keeping ahead of Konstantin Liskonoh’s team by goal difference. Let us also remark an unexpected defeat of one of our main competitors in getting to play-off – the team of DYSSh-5 which lost 1:2 to Cobra-CPTO-3.