The Ukraine national football team is the national football team of Ukraine and is controlled by the Football Federation of Ukraine. After the split of Soviet Union, they played their first match against Hungary on April 29, 1992.
Before that, Ukrainian players played for the USSR national football team, with Dynamo Kyiv players often forming its backbone (1986 World Cup, Euro 88). Some of the best Ukrainian players of the beginning of 1990's (including Andrei Kanchelskis, Viktor Onopko and Oleg Salenko) chose to play for Russia as it was named the official successor of the USSR, while Ukraine didn't participate in major international competitions until 1994. However, they achieved qualification for the 2006 World Cup, the first time for the team.
Despite having one of the best players in the world, Andriy Shevchenko, Ukraine failed to qualify for any major championship before 2005, three times failing at the last stage, the playoffs. It lost to Croatia, failing to get to the 1998 World Cup, Slovenia prevented Ukraine from going to Euro 2000, and Germany stopped them prior to the 2002 World Cup.
After an unsuccessful Euro 2004 campaign, Ukraine appointed Oleg Blokhin as the national team's head coach. This would eventually prove to be a good move, as Ukraine went on to qualify for their first-ever FIFA World Cup on September 3, 2005 by drawing their match with Georgia, 1-1, in T'bilisi.
