In Lviv, at the stadium of the Bosco Sports Centre, the 5th round of the First League of the Ukrainian Amputee Football Championship has kicked off. The home stage is a special one for the Pokrova AMP club: it is here that the team is marking three years since its founding and has started the tour with a confident victory.
On 12 September 2023, on this very pitch, the first training session of Pokrova AMP took place; the club was founded by priests of the Salesian Congregation of Saint John Bosco of the UGCC. In three years, the club has grown to almost fifty players and two teams competing in the national amputee football championship — football for people with amputations who play moving on crutches.
This season a second team has been established — Pokrova AMP-2, to involve even more civilian and military veterans in sport as a tool for physical and psychological rehabilitation. It was Pokrova AMP-2 that played the first match of the home round against the Rivne side Veres Mriya and won 3–0.
The team captain, Petro Kornaha, stressed that the match was an important event for the players both in sporting and in rehabilitation terms.
“We are very happy that today we have such a great occasion — our team is three years old! It turned out to be a really great match, we won 3–0, we had really strong opponents, it was a real pleasure to play against them. We wanted the win, we are the leaders and we want to stay that way to the end. Tournaments like this matter a great deal. All our friends and brothers-in-arms are here, we were all at the front together, and that is really something special. This football is first and foremost about rehabilitation, because you recover, and then it becomes a passion: you try it once or twice and then you can’t do without it. It’s a really great sport, and we invite everyone — at Pokrova the doors are always open for all the lads,” said Petro Kornaha.
Goalkeeper Mykola Savytskyi noted that taking part in the championship helps players switch off from everyday worries and experience a new emotional lift. According to him, following the coach’s instructions and playing as a team were the keys to victory.
Player Andrii Skolozdra emphasised that a team sport is especially important for veterans who have returned from the front with amputations. Joint training sessions and matches, he said, provide moral support, an incentive to develop and help them move on more quickly from what they went through in the war.
As part of the Lviv round, Pokrova AMP-2 will play two more fixtures: at 16:00 the team will face Titany, and the next day at 12:00 they will meet Dnipro Chest. The matches are being held at the Bosco Sports Centre stadium at 17a Kryvchytska Doroha Street, with free admission for supporters.
At present, Pokrova AMP-2 top the First League table, holding a two-point lead over their closest rivals. The home stage in Lviv could therefore prove one of the decisive ones in the battle for the championship title.
The Ukrainian Amputee Football Championship is organised by the Ukrainian Association of Football and the UAF Foundation with the support of the Ministry of Veterans Affairs of Ukraine, the Ministry of Youth and Sports of Ukraine, the Agency of Mass Sport of Ukraine and the exclusive partner of the “Liga Duzhykh” — Mastercard and Oschadbank.
Match video: