“We train pending the sound of anti-aircraft sirens”

For him Shakhtar, tomorrow’s visit is not another one to the Bernabéu. The Ukrainian team now knows the football flag of a country hit by the Russian invasion. Shakhtar himself suffers from it, exiled between Lviv and Warsaw, where he will receive Madrid next week. In front, an old acquaintance of the white club, Igor Jovicevic. The Croatian coach, who spent five years at Chamartín in the early 1990s, attends AS to talk about a team that has had to rebuild itself almost from scratch after the massive exodus of its foreign footballers…

Shakhtar have prepared their visit to the European champions going back and forth between Lviv and Warsaw, in a context punctuated by war. How do they manage in that chaos?

Chaos sometimes organizes (laughs). I work in a big club and we have everything planned. That said, it is a complex situation to manage, especially the emotional state of the footballers. Also tiredness. When you live in the hotel, the plane, the train and the bus instead of at home, you lose a lot of energy and concentration, it goes hand in hand. On the first day a Ukrainian league match was stopped by air raid sirens and took four hours to finish. We want to be competitive, but between match and match nobody knows what we are going through…

Have those anti-aircraft sirens sounded to you?

In games no, in training it does happen and you have to be aware and follow the instructions that the armed forces give us. The head is affected. Training in Lviv pending a possible attack is not the same as the peace of mind with which you can work in Poland. We also talked about how many of the people in the club and also the players are from Donetsk. In 2014 they had to flee their homes and seven months ago they had to flee from kyiv. It is a brutal situation. As athletes, in the end, we also play for the soldiers who are fighting to defend their country. You know that they follow you and that you are giving them a positive emotion for the duration of a match. It is a huge responsibility. It pushes us and gives us energy.

It’s up to him, I guess, to be almost more of a psychologist than a coach…

You do not know where this situation is going to go, it generates concern, it is inevitable. I can say that the group I have is fantastic. In addition to football, they are very involved in politics. In lending a hand to his people in whatever is needed, a social work. I decided to return to Ukraine because I have played and trained here and I love the mentality of the country. They are very good-natured and when they see that you get involved, they give you everything. I felt a debt, which I had to return, almost inexplicable. My friends in Croatia did not understand. I had to weigh the pros and cons a lot, but I decided to see the glass as half full. And once that internal fight is resolved, I have to generate enormous concentration to guide my players. That although we are looking at the sky to see if nothing falls on us, we have to compete. Many people are not aware of what we suffer and generate empathy between us. We have created a synergy and we are stronger, we row together.

You sign for Shakhtar on July 14 and he has to rebuild a squad in which almost all the foreign soccer players (there were 13 Brazilians without going any further) had fled…

The beginning of the war created a difficult situation to crack for the Ukrainian clubs. Many players left and did not want to return. When I arrived, the sports project was almost down. Without the Brazilians, without the other foreigners… In the preseason I met many young Ukrainians who came back from loan because they had never had a place at Shakhtar. Now the war has spawned them one momentyour big chance. They have to grow up fast, now they are the Brazilians. And we have gone on to take twelve players with the Ukrainian team. I managed to bring two foreigners that I already knew, the Brazilian Taylor, who was at PAOK and I trained him in Dnipro, and the Croatian Djurasek, who I had at Dinamo Zagreb. There is also Lassina Traoré, from Burkina Faso, who did want to stay. We only have three foreigners.

One of those Brazilians who left is Vinicius Tobias… who now plays on loan at Raúl’s Castilla.

Madrid has people with a lot of sense of smell. They have a buy option and if you keep pointing these ways they will surely want to buy it. I wish him the best because he’s a good player, with a track record and good manners. Let’s see how he and the situation develops.

You have raised a group capable of win 1-4 in Leipzig e draw 1-1 against Celtic. Does your team play with an extra dose of heart?

There is a patriotic component, it is there. We no longer play for money, we play with the heart. Our owner is one of the richest in the country, but his business has been greatly affected. The head intervenes in the games, but we play from the emotions and more when you are going to face squads that are worth 500 million euros. It is to see us in the Champions League. For me, a dream of always that I could fulfill. In Leipzig I was so excited and my players so excited that it was impossible to lose (laughs). We will be the Cinderella of the group, but we have shown that nobody has given us anything, that we are a team that belongs in its own right to the Champions League.

Madrid have won nine of their ten games of the season and the other has been a draw…

We are the outsiders and we measure ourselves against the best club on the planet. If you analyze them tactically, you see mistakes where you can catch them… but they don’t score goals. And if they are marked, Madrid responds with goals in pairs. It is such a brutal individual force that although sometimes they seem somewhat anarchic, they have so much experience that they dominate time, space, they know how to suffer and they are convinced that they are going to win. You have to touch excellence and that your goalkeeper sneaks between his legs (laughs).

A lot of people won’t remember it or won’t know it, but Igor Jovicecic was a Real Madrid footballer for five seasons in the 1990s and also with a signing of those of film…

I was 17 years old. Later, my admired Del Bosque told me that I had been on his agenda for a long time. I came from being runner-up in Europe U-17 and I was chosen the best of the tournament. I had offers and being in Verona finalizing my signing for that club in a hotel… I see a team enter. I recognize Radomic Antic, may he rest in peace. It was Madrid, they had gone there to play a tournament.

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That was just the beginning…

I knew Prosinecki and chatted with him and Antic. Madrid was very much alive and suggested that I return with them to Spain. I went, I played a couple of games under another name and I was hidden in a hotel incognito until a journalist discovered me… In the end the signing was closed.

Why do people sometimes keep looking askance at winners like Del Bosque or now Carletto for training with the left hand?

If you win everything with your left hand, why change, with a heavy hand you can only spoil it… The same thing happened to Zidane, despite winning three consecutive Champions Leagues. If they were criticized, imagine me. I am clear that those coaches we are talking about are very emotionally intelligent. In terms of tactics, we all have assistants who also work with computers and prepare systems for you, counteract opposing systems… What an assistant can’t do is what Vicente, Ancelotti or Zidane do. Entering a locker room and the players recognizing in you a kindness and above all that wisdom. It is respect, and the footballer feels it. No need to be eloquent, just get to the point, because the player will understand and die for you. I remember my debut with Jorge Valdano…

Tell me.

It was a match in Oviedo in Prosinecki’s debut with them. Madrid didn’t have the internationals, Laudrup among them, that’s why they gave me number 10. In the tunnel, Jorge told me something I’ll never forget: “Igor, throw a pipe as soon as you can.” With that, he wanted me to relax. He knew that with that pipe, if it came out, I would fly the whole match. I admire him, Valdano is a soccer wise man, he is on another level.

Hábleme de su good friend Sergio Scariolo…

We talked a few days ago. With Sergio I have lived a lot in Marbella and he is a top person. Intelligence, those measured words… And as a coach, what to say. thumbs up Look at that new generation that he has made champion. A bit like mine. Let’s see if we get as far as them (laughs). His management, that way of making a group, is an example because it is the most difficult thing for a coach.

I know Modric owes him a shirt, it’s time…

I already thought it was never going to happen (he lets out a laugh). It was around 2017 or so, I was seeing my friend Ramis in Valdebebas and I was able to talk to Luka. I asked for the shirt. Although we are in contact, we never coincided, so the last time I jokingly told him that he would give it to me when he was 40 years old and was playing for the Los Angeles Galaxy… Well, fate has wanted it to be now. What Modric is doing, playing at this level at his age and at the best club in the world, no one has done. Neither Iniesta nor Xavi, for example, who left much earlier for other clubs. I adore him and it is an honor to see him with Croatia, he is the definition of a leader.

From Modric to Mudryk. Is it as good as it seems?

He always stood out, for years, anyone who knows Ukrainian football knows it. His skills, his speed, that dribbling and that self-confidence… Everyone’s time comes for him and this is his time. Last year he stood out, but he lacked opportunities. I know that the Bernabéu kept his name. He now has the responsibility that he is the one who has to be decisive. Let’s see what material it is made of.

Every interview I do with him asks him the same thing, so I insist. When will we see him train in Spain?

Spain is like my home. I have lived there since 1991 and my brother works in Valladolid. We stayed there since my father was as Rafa Benítez’s assistant. Then I was a lot in Marbella, my base of operations. I love Spain, the way of living, of tapas (laughs). LaLiga is a dream for me and I work to achieve it. I didn’t make it as a footballer due to a serious knee injury. Now I will appear at the Bernabéu and in the Champions League. I will feel like when I made my debut as a Real Madrid player as a teenager, in 1991, in a 2-1 win against Figueras. I see myself doing what I couldn’t then and it’s exciting. If it even happens that we’re going to stay at the Eurostars hotel, one of the four towers where the old sports city used to be… It’s wonderful.