Shamrock Rovers — Shakhtar, photo FC Shakhtar Donetsk November 27, 2025, 11:56 p.m

Thursday evening in the “green and black” colors of the UEFA Conference League for Ukrainian fans continued with the confrontation with the participation of another representative of our country on the international arena this fall, Shakhtar Donetsk, against the Irish club Shamrock Rovers in Dublin. The role of Arda Turan’s team, in particular, was also to make us forget as soon as possible about the performance of Dynamo Kyiv a few minutes before the start of the reported confrontation.

And still, the “miners” managed to improve our mood a little with their game on the field of the newly crowned champions of the championship title and the Irish Cup. At least the first half Shakhtar spent from an accentuated position of strength and dominated the opponents in all indicators. In addition to trying to play on the second floor, a certain thing, because on this, as well as on quick counterattacks, Steven Bradley’s wards made their emphasis.

At the same time, the people of Donetsk gradually escalated the situation at the other side’s goal and were in no hurry to speed up the attack too much, so as not to expose themselves to problems behind. But when the opponents were beaten one-on-one, the difference in the skill of the performers became clearly visible. In the end, at the 23rd minute, the wall of Vinicius and Kryskiv on the right flank of the penalty area ended with a cross to the center for Elias, who sent the ball into the net of the other side’s goal.

Shakhtar tried to press the opponents again and again after that, but instead played a little and almost got in the nuts. McGovern’s two killer chances, which came from the right wing at the end of the first half, were simply impossible to allow, but Turan’s team made mistakes, and in the end the striker first missed a mistake past the right post, but his second long-range effort had to be kicked out of an empty net by Bondar.

To avoid similar moments in the second half – this was the plan of the “miners” after the break. Should have been. However, already after the return of the teams on the field, we saw how Shamrock Rovers rushed to the Fesyun goal with double zeal and, indeed, it can be said that in the moments of Grant and Healy, when first Bondar once again insured his own goalkeeper on the line, and then Fesyun himself parried an opponent’s shot from the middle distance, where the visitors were lucky.

It’s good that the players of Turan managed to take this arbitrariness at their own goal away with the passage of time and instead advance in their own attacks again. And even Shakhtar’s second goal was scored in the 77th minute, when Nazarina was given a free kick from the left wing, and a powerful shot with a ricochet off the wall flew past the opponent’s goalkeeper.

The Donetsk team immediately tried to remove all questions in this meeting with the third goal, and even scored it in the end. Elias distinguished himself with a double at the end of a corner kick from the left flank from the same Nazarina, hitting the far corner on a close fly. Well, he almost scored, if Matvienko had not prevented the opponent from knocking out the rebound from the post from the empty net, while being offside at the time of the shot. So the goal had to be canceled. It would have been better if Nazarina himself scored a long-range shot, or Neverton scored their beautiful and legitimate goals a few moments before.

Because instead of 3:0 in their own favor, Shakhtar got 1:2 out of nothing when they missed a pass to the right corner of the goalkeeper from Burke to Melli, and this time it was trivial for anyone to knock Fesyun over the head from an empty net. However, it would have been possible to do without nerves, if Elias would have shot somewhere past the goalkeeper before the end of regular time, and not directly at him, during another meeting in someone else’s penalty area. And yes, we had to watch out for the opponents’ big attackers.

In the next round, Ireland’s Shamrock Rovers will play away to Iceland’s Breidablik, while Shakhtar Donetsk will travel to Malta’s Hamrun Spartans.

Miner: Riznyk — Vinicius, Bondar, Matvienko, Azarov (Pedrinho Azevedo, 74) — Kryskiv (Ocheretko, 74), Nazarina, Izaki — Lucas (Bondarenko, 74), Elias (Meirellish, 90+3), Neverton (Konoplia, 84).

Warning: Lopes