Arsenal vs Shakhtar Donetsk: Football seems to be secondary

In total, Arsenal have played against Shakhtar Donetsk four times, all four games were in the Champions League – and all four games were won by the home team…

Now I have to admit that I am not entirely familiar with the situation in Ukraine regarding football after the Russian invasion. So if I have misunderstood something below, I would appreciate polite corrections, if possible English sources for the information used. But for now I'll do my best, then we can at least start with somewhat solid information…

Because from our point of view it was certainly their most famous player Henrikh Mkhitaryan, who played for Arsenal between 2018 and 2020. He is currently at Inter Milan and has played 35 games for Arsenal, scoring eight goals. He has played 95 times for Armenia.

But of course we have the results of the previous games between the two teams….

And the interesting thing is that there have been a few goals in our guests' last games – for example, 16 goals in the last five games alone. Three of the games were wins (4:0, 5:0 and 1:0) and one loss and one draw…

But their league looks very different to the one we see in England, not least because we are playing against a club from a country that is, of course, at war. In its early days, the club played in the Russian league and, as expected, was based in the city of Donetsk until 2014. But then the Russian invasion forced him to move to Lviv and then to Kharkiv, and if I read the story correctly, then back to Lviv. This means they are playing 1000 miles away from their primary residence.

After the country's independence, Shakhtar Donestsk became the first Ukrainian club to win a European competition and is one of only two clubs (along with Dynamo Kwiw) to have won one of UEFA's major competitions. However, since the Russian invasion, the club has successfully been forced to move twice.

From 2014 to the end of 2016, Shakhtar played its home games in the arena. Then it moved a few hundred miles to Kharkiv and had to play its 2022/23 European Games in Warsaw. As far as I know, they played their Champions League games in Hamburg last season.

Meanwhile, as we have already established, the Champions League table is crazy, as is the entire organizational system of this season, in which selected teams play each other once. But that's UEFA for you. Basically, Arsenal are in 13th place with one win and one draw, while Shakhtar are in 27th place with one draw and one loss.

Arsenal's situation is that they scored two goals and conceded none. Shakter didn't score any goals and conceded three goals. According to Arsenal.com, “No team has scored more goals in the (Ukrainian league) this season than Shakhtar (25).”

The main advantage for Arsenal tonight is of course that the referee is not a member of the PGMO and therefore is not subject to their own specific rules and regulations, but exactly what rules and regulations he will follow I cannot say. We can only wait, and from Untold's perspective, we certainly have the utmost compassion and affection for Ukraine in its fight to maintain its independence.