As far as this stage consisted of only one game, only victory was a satisfactory outcome for our team.
It should be mentioned that Mircea Lucescu let 18-year-old defender Illia Zabarnyi be among first eleven although he made his debut for Dynamo only four days before that. Meanwhile Viktor Tsyhankov missed the game due to health issues.
At first the tempo wasn’t high as both sides tried not to make any mistakes. There were no scoring chances for about half an hour, but there were a lot of fouls and two Kyivans were booked – Buialskyi and Rodrigues.
Finally Dynamo earned a free kick on the right side, but de Pena’s attempt wasn’t much of a success. AZ had a decent attack when Gudmundsson found Boadu in a dangerous position, but Bushchan was there for his team.
Buialskyi had a good opportunity after low cross by Kedziora from the right wing, but Vlaar blocked Vitaliy’s shot.
Anyway, shortly after the break the White-Blues opened the score. Buialskyi won the ball in front of AZ penalty area and passed to Rodrigues, who made it 1:0.
After that the game got more intense. Dutch side rushed forward and Kyivans got space. Supriaha didn’t use his chance in one-on-one situation. Later he failed to turn the cross by de Pena into goal. Alkmaar side responded with header by Druijf, but the ball went over the bar. Idrissi missed too. Buialskyi and de Pena also had chances. Long story short, the game got more dynamic and spectacular.
Late in the second half Shaparenko increased Dynamo lead. Rodrigues found Kedziora in the right wing, Tomasz put a cross into the box, AZ keeper barely reached it and Shaparenko headed it in. Right after that visitors could pull one back, but Bushchan performed incredible save after de Wit’s strike point blank.
So, it’s 2:0 and Dynamo reach the Champions League qualification play-off round. They’ll face Belgian side KAA Gent at this stage.
UEFA Champions League, 3rd qualifying round
FC Dynamo Kyiv – AZ Alkmaar – 2:0 (0:0)
Dynamo: Bushchan, Kedziora, Zabarnyi, Mykolenko, Sydorchuk (c), Buialskyi (Andriyevskyi, 79), Shaparenko (Liedniev, 90+1), de Pena, Karavayev, Supriaha (Verbic, 74), Rodrigues.
AZ: Bizot, Svensson, Vlaar (Sugawara, 79), Koopmeiners, Wijndal, de Wit, Clasie, Midtsjo (Druijf, 66), Stengs, Gudmundsson (Idrissi, 58), Boadu.
Goals: Rodrigues (48), Shaparenko (86).
Booked: Buialskyi (15), Rodrigues (19) Kedziora (85) – Stengs (33), Clasie (83), Idrissi (85).
