It was only last Wednesday that Pavelko felt confident that the sport would return on the date, a day before the celebration of Ukraine’s independence, that he had set. It was then that the security protocols were finally signed after grueling talks that were not always straightforward. Should fans be allowed in? This question was easy enough to answer during the war. Should the exact time and location of the games be kept secret? This was up for discussion but ultimately rejected. What if and when the air raid sirens stop playing? No one can be quite sure how this will feel, but games may be abandoned if they are heard for more than an hour. The arbitrators will confer with military advisers to make this decision. The list of considerations is extensive. This is new, uncharted territory and modifications are expected along the way. “It was a big challenge in my life,” says Pavelko, speaking animatedly at FA headquarters. Work there never really stopped: as soon as Russia invaded, there were 24-hour efforts to evacuate teams, players, referees and coaches. Efforts to help on the humanitarian front quickly followed, and then the issue of reentry began. The leading clubs were unanimous in pushing it forward, but two meetings with Volodymyr Zelenskiy at the end of May were decisive in gathering political will. “I popped the question and got a resounding ‘Yes,’” he says. “They were conversations about what our society needs right now. It needs a strong signal. The president was ready to give us everything we needed to inform the world that Ukraine is a strong country and that we are confident of our victory.” Pavelko spends the next half hour offering a whirlwind account of visits – he has traveled to every region of Ukraine at least twice since February – and personal stories that convinced him that football was fundamental to the country’s resistance and recovery. Lands on a particular one that did the job asked of it flawlessly. In a hospital in Zaporizhzhia, the city that received thousands of evacuees from Mariupol, he met a boy who had suffered 18 broken bones along with shrapnel wounds to the head and chest. Every participant in this season will go down in the history of world football Andriy Pavelko The 12-year-old’s blood pressure had dropped to the point where he was barely alive when he arrived and his survival is yet another story of the heroic work of local doctors in the midst of impossible conditions. Pavelko found that he played football shortly before his evacuation and that his favorite player was Oleksandr Zinchenko. He immediately called the deputy leader of Ukraine and the boy, unable to move and burst into tears, took a video call with his idol. “It was a hair’s breadth from death, like the rest of Ukraine,” says Pavelko. Fortunately, his treatment continued in Germany and he is learning to walk again. These stories of kinship, bravery and, at times, tragedy could fill several books, and Pavelko says he would gladly write one when Ukraine finally prevails. People like the boy in Mariupol inadvertently delivered the message he was trying to convey: that, far from being simple in times of unimaginable horror, football has its place. Andriy Pavelko, the president of the Ukrainian FA. Photo: Rob Harris/AP For the opener which will be Kyiv’s Olympiyskiy Stadium, which hosted the Euro 2012 final and the 2018 Champions League final. In the week that Zelensky was among those warning of possible Russian attacks on Independence Day, it will inevitably hold your breath. Those attending should guarantee that, if instructed, they will relocate to the air raid shelter on the ground. It will be surreal and perhaps embarrassing, but Pavelko makes no apologies. Start your evenings with the Guardian’s view of the world of football Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain information about charities, online advertising and content sponsored by external parties. For more information, see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and Google’s Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. “We are a brave nation,” he says. “This is an important step to boost the morale of both civilian and military personnel: to remind them that they have a future. I met with our referees recently and gave them a simple message: that every participant in this will go down in the history of world football. It is a monumental achievement that they will be able to share with their grandchildren, and the grandchildren will brag about to their peers.” It’s also a fair achievement that the 16-man top flight only missed out on FC Mariupol and Desna Chernihiv, both of whose businesses are on hold. But the postponement of FC Lviv’s first game against Minaj, amid suggestions that he will struggle to fulfill games, shows that the quest to keep Ukrainian football on track has yet to be won. Further down the league, it’s a grimmer story: at least two dozen teams have been forced to suspend operations or disband. The second tier resumes on Saturday but, below those at the top, there is still uncertainty. The hope is, however, that Tuesday will send a wave of optimism across the country. Pavelko draws parallels with the famous “death struggle” played out when Ukraine was occupied by Germany in 1942 – though believed in some quarters to have been mythologised – with one key difference. “Our tournament is not a story of death but of life.”
