18-Year Old Goalkeeper Quits Football to Join Ukraine Army : Shakhtar Donetsk U19 goalkeeper Volodymyr Seheda has put his football career on hold to join the Ukrainian Armed Forces.
The 18 year old is currently at one of the training centres.
The Luhansk born keeper was evacuated to Croatia last year with SD’s academy before returning to join the army.
It has now been more than a year since Russia invaded Ukraine. The Shakhtar Donetsk U19 goalkeeper Seheda announced on Saturday that he was putting his career on hold to join the army and defend his homeland.
As he turned 18 on October 27th, the keeper had been training for some time in one of the country’s military centers. Evacuated, like the entire U19 team, to Croatia at the start of the conflict, he returned to the territory at the start of the season.
“I thought long and hard and made the decision to return to Ukraine. I just can’t sit here when there’s a war in my country. I never thought of becoming a soldier, but now my homeland needs it. Playing football is a dream of my life, and I don’t refuse it. After the victory, I would like to return to football,” he told local media Terrikon.
The Russo-Ukrainian War previously referred to as the Ukrainian crisis in its early stages, is an ongoing international conflict between Russia, alongside Russian-backed separatists, and Ukraine, which began in February 2014.
Following Ukraine’s Revolution of Dignity, Russia annexed Crimea from Ukraine and supported pro-Russian separatists fighting the Ukrainian military in the Donbas war.
The first eight years of conflict also included naval incidents, cyberwarfare, and heightened political tensions. In February 2022, Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
In early 2014, the Euromaidan protests led to the Revolution of Dignity and the ousting of Ukraine’s pro-Russian president Viktor Yanukovych. Shortly after, pro-Russian unrest erupted in eastern and southern Ukraine. Simultaneously, unmarked Russian troops moved into Ukraine’s Crimea and took over government buildings, strategic sites and infrastructure. Russia soon annexed Crimea after a highly-disputed referendum.
In April 2014, armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings in Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region and proclaimed the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) and Luhansk People’s Republic (LPR) as independent states, starting the Donbas war.
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