Shakhtar make winning start at new Champions League 'home'

LONDON: Nomadic Ukrainian champions Shakhtar Donetsk celebrated moving into their new Champions League "home" at Stamford Bridge by storming back to beat AEK Athens 3-1 on Wednesday.

Fans of the club turned up in their thousands to support the team, who emerged from the tunnel draped in blue-and-yellow national flags.

The Greek side took the lead in the 28th minute through Lovro Majer but Pedrinho levelled confidently from the penalty spot just six minutes later.

With about 10 minutes of normal time to go, Vinicius Tobias found the net from a tight angle and substitute Gleiker Mendoza made the game safe, smashing home after cutting in from the left.

The result leaves Shakhtar on four points after two games after a draw against PSV Eindhoven in their opening match in the league phase of the Champions League.

Shakhtar, from the east of Ukraine, are using Chelsea's ground as the base for their European fixtures this season, with the Londoners absent from continental competition.

On the eve of the match, the club's chief executive Sergei Palkin spoke of how playing at the home of the two-time European champions would keep the war-torn nation's struggles "visible."

Shakhtar were forced to leave their home ground, the Donbas Arena in Donetsk, after pro-Russia separatists seized control of the city in 2014.

Since then the team has lived an itinerant existence, playing home European matches elsewhere in Ukraine as well in Poland, Germany and Slovenia due to the security situation in their homeland.

London made sense as the next base for the team.

Since the beginning of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the UK has provided refuge to 265,000 Ukrainians, according to the Ukrainian embassy in London.

Fans from the ex-pat population turned out in force on Wednesday, swelling the crowd to 29,000 – around 11,000 short of capacity.

- 'Blessing' -

"I think it's such a blessing to see my team play here," James Upson, a 20-year-old student, whose mother is from Ukraine and father from the UK, told AFP.

"Obviously, it's unfortunate we can't play in our country, but here it's just a beautiful sight for them to come out to the Champions League anthem in such a beautiful, beautiful stadium."

He said playing in London was a way to keep the Ukraine conflict in the public eye, on a day when Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky was in London for talks with British Prime Minister Andy Burnham.

"We have to keep ourselves relevant, and we do our best to do so," said Upson. "We played in Valencia as the national team recently. You know, we had good outreach there.

"But to have a local club come to the UK and play here in four matches is just such a wonderful sight."

Marta Palas, 17, said many of her classmates do even not realise the war in Ukraine is still going on.

"I'm about to graduate high school and people don't know about the war, at all," she said.

"They think it's not going on anymore, but it does. It's still on, and it does – it did get harsher, honestly, from back in 2022. It is quite a hard situation right now."

Serzh Dadizha, 22, a Ukrainian student who studies in Britain, told AFP he wanted to help his team from the stands.

"I want to feel like I'm a 12th player, like I belong here, like I make an impact for my team, like I do something. Not just to watch the show."

Snoop, who goes by his nickname, travelled all the way London from his home in Finland to watch his adopted team.

"When I was a teenager and I saw what was happening in Donbas and Donetsk, I just felt like some kind of compassion for them," said the 26-year-old. "So yeah, it comes from deep in the heart."

Shakhtar, UEFA Cup winners in 2009 and Conference League semi-finalists last season, next host Sporting Lisbon, with Fenerbahce and Real Madrid to follow at their new temporary home. - AFP