Belkevitch blow for Belarus

Belarus will be without their key playmaker, Valentin Belkevitch, for their first EURO 2004™ qualifying tie against the Netherlands on Saturday in Eindhoven.

Khatskevitch struggling
While Belkevitch, of FC Dynamo Kyiv, is definitely out, his team-mate Alexander Khatskevitch is questionable with an achilles tendon problem. Artem Chelyadinsky, the FC Sokol Saratov defender, is suffering from a similar injury and faces a battle to be fit in time for the Group 3 match.

Ryndyuk returns
However, Nikolay Ryndyuk returns to the national side after the settlement of a long dispute with his former club, Gaziantepspor of Turkey, which has seen him move to the Russian first division leaders FC Rubin Kazanj. Meanwhile, Belarus goalkeeper Gennadiy Tumilovitch has signed a two-year deal with the Belgian side R. Antwerp FC.

'We can do it'
"I would like to say sorry to all the Belarussians after we failed to make it to the [FIFA] World Cup," coach Eduard Malofeev said. "We will do our best to get to EURO 2004™ now. It is very hard to do, but we can do it. Holland is very rich in football tradition and has some outstanding players. But I am optimistic about the outlook."

Belarus squad
Tumilovich, Khomoutovsky, Shantalosov, Ostrovsky, Shuneiko, Lukhvich, Stanyuk, Omelyanchik, Khrapkovsky, Yaskovich, Chelyadinsky, Gurenko, Korytko, Gleb, Kulchiy, Khatskevitch, Kovba, Romashenko, Volodenkov, Tarlovsky, Kutuzov, Kachuro, Vasilyuk, Ryndyuk.