Ukraine 1996-98 Home matchworn/prepared?
Ukraine 2012-14 Home, matchworn Marko Devych v Turkey
Ukraine 2012-14 Away
Ukraine 2016-17 Home
Ukraine 2021-23 Home, matchworn/prepared Olha Basanska
One of the more spectacular Puma templates around, this is something special. A tiled hexagonal pattern across the entire shirt, visible even on the “plain” colour torso really makes the shirt. Every part draws the eye and there’s nothing boring about it. On the sleeves, the pattern stands out more with the white outlines, which is a nice touch. Twin yellow stripes on the collar and sleeve cuffs liven them up as well. The only slight disappointment is the yellow stripes along the tops of the sleeves. It clashes a little with the sleeves themselves and that’s a shame. Nonetheless, a spectacular shirt.
These shirts were used across Ukraine’s 1998 World Cup qualifiers. They were drawn with two tough opponents in Germany and Portugal. They didn’t might light work of the 3 lower seeds either, drawing 1-1 with Armenia at home and only managing single goal victories home and away to Northern Ireland and Albania. However, a 2-1 victory over Portugal at home and a 0-0 draw with Germany mitigated away losses. They finished in the play-off spot, being drawn against Croatia. A 2-0 away loss set the tone and a 1-1 home draw couldn’t overcome it, falling just short of the tournament.
So, this would be a boring Adidas shirt if it wasn’t for the stripe. The pattern incorporates the FA logo but doesn’t just tile it and it stands out nicely without being too blatant. The pixel art style of it also appeals, though possibly just because I’m a gamer. Blue and yellow does work as a colour scheme but the main let down of the shirt is the transfer badge. It looks a little too large and the Adidas logo is central so without numbers it looks odd.
Regardless, Ukraine used the design for 2014 World Cup qualification. Drawn in a group with England, Montenegro, Poland, Moldova and San Marino their task was to grab the 1st or 2nd spot. 2 draws with England should’ve probably been enough but 2 results ruined that. A 0-0 draw away in Moldova and a 1-0 loss at home to Montenegro relegated them to 2nd place (and 3 behind on goal difference). Drawn against France for the qualification spot, they grabbed a solid 2-0 first leg victory but lost 3-0 in France and narrowly failed to qualify.
It might be mostly yellow but there’s blue everywhere here. I’ve heard it called too busy, but Ukraine continue throwing traditional patterns around. One down each side and a fading out one up the front under the logo is pretty cool. To help that, blue accenting spikes all over the shirt. The FA logo also gets smaller and more reserved to help with my main issue with the previous shirt.
Ukraine were probably expect to at least get a play-off spot for the 2018 World Cup when they wore this shirt. Drawn in a group with Croatia, Iceland, Turkey, Finland and new boys Kosovo, their campaign was immediately dented with 2 draws, to Iceland at home and to Turkey away. Rarely dominate, they also lost home and away to Croatia, as well as in Reykjavik, to finish 3rd in the group, a full 3 points distant of second place.
A shirt that certainly provoked some raised eyebrows when it was released, Ukraine entered the Polyester Atlas but adding their country’s outline around their FA logo. Certainly makes the logo stand out. Interestingly there’s not a lot else to the shirt, there’s enough blue around the edges to keep it from being too plain, but otherwise it is fairly simple. Typeface for the numbers is quite nice, but with the centralised logo it can look a little lopsided without them. A decent shirt, but likely wouldn’t have been remembered so much if it weren’t for the objections to including Crimea.
The design came in for Euro 2020, and stuck around for subsequent qualifiers. The Euros went reasonably, but started unspectacularly, with a late 3-2 loss to the Netherlands, a 1-0 loss to Austria and a narrow 2-1 win over debutants North Macedonia. Only 3 points, but a reasonable goal difference meant that they slipped through as a best 3rd place team. They took nearly the full length of extra time to sink Sweden 2-1 before coming up against England. The English swept them aside 4-0 in the quarter-finals, but for their first ever Euros knockout stage appearance it was a good showing.
These results are fairly typical of Ukraine. Since their independence, they’ve regularly competed at a very good standard but seem to excel in falling just short. They’ve reached qualification play-offs 5 times and failed each time, to opponents Greece, Slovenia, Germany, France and Croatia. As co-hosts in Euro 2012, they beat Sweden, only to lose to France and England and not progress. A well rated team qualified for Euro 2016 but were the only team to lose every game and not score a single goal. However, they topped their 2006 World Cup, Euro 2020 and 2018-19 Nations League (tier B) groups. At 2006, they beat Tunisia and Saudi Arabia to reach the knockouts (also losing 4-0 to Spain) and then defeated Switzerland 3-0 on penalties after a 0-0 draw before Italy knocked them out 3-0 in the quarter-finals. Euro 2020 proved another highlight, but it came at the expense of getting relegated from League A of the Nations League. They narrowly failed to bounce back and remain in League B to date.
The Ukraine women’s side has also lost a number of qualification play-offs, but seems a little fonder of 3rd place then the men. The typical inequality in women’s football means that they struggle against the top teams but mostly perform well. A sole tournament qualification came for Euro 2009, where they narrowly missed out on an automatic spot but thrashed Slovenia 5-0 in the resulting play-off. A 2-0 loss to the Netherlands and 2-1 to Denmark had already condemned them, but they regained some honour by defeating already qualified Finland 1-0. The women’s youth sides have typically done poorly, with the men’s sides barely better, though there are a few standout campaigns. 5 times European semi-finalists at youth level and 2019 U20 World Champions are not results to be sniffed at. There is, however, little consistency.
They are futsal regulars, with their peak coming around the late 90’s/early 2000’s. 4th place in the world at Spain ’96 they then failed to qualify for the next Euros and World Cup before 3 consecutive top 8 finishes in the world and 3 consecutive top 4 finishes in Europe came out (two 2nds, one 4th). Since then, they’ve fallen slightly to the status of regular qualifiers and knockout participants but rarely progressing further. In beach soccer, Ukraine typically are very good in qualification, qualifying for the 2005, 2011 and 2013 tournaments, but only have one knockout appearance to show for that. They’ve never lost all their games and regularly go to shoot-outs to determine results (instead of draws) but, as is becoming almost a theme, they’ve always fallen short of the final hurdle.
Ukraine were expected to be very competitive in a mixed group with France, Finland, Bosnia-Herzegovina and Kazakhstan. However, a start of 5 consecutive draws was disastrous, with only negative results for their competitors keeping them in the fight. 2 wins and a draw along with results elsewhere dragged them into a play-off spot but, having beaten Scotland, they fell 1-0 to Wales in a very close decider. Typical Ukraine, but they did have a lot going on at the time.
Adam's National Shirt Collection 