Dema Kovalenko spent his entire childhood dreaming of playing professional soccer in one of Europe’s major leagues. So when he was loaned to FC St. Pauli of the German Bundesliga, one of the world’s premier leagues, his dream should have been fulfilled.
Instead, Kovalenko returned to Chicago last week a little disillusioned.
“It was a great experience,” Kovalenko said. “I don’t want to blame the team or blame anybody, [but] it was a little different that what I thought.”
Because of injuries to Ante Razov and Hristo Stoitchkov, the Fire was shorthanded once again. With Kovalenko not in St. Pauli’s future plans, Major League Soccer and St. Pauli officials agreed to let Kovalenko return to Chicago about a month earlier than planned and be available when the team opens its MLS season Saturday at Columbus.
In his first three seasons with the Fire, Kovalenko has been used primarily as an attacking midfielder or forward. St. Pauli used him as a defender most of the time.
“I don’t want to make any excuses, but I’m not a defender,” Kovalenko said. “I played in the back 85 percent of the time. It was very hard.”
St. Pauli made a big splash about bringing Kovalenko to Germany. But the team has floundered in the Bundesliga, and Kovalenko, the highly-touted foreigner, shouldered much of the blame.
“When you bring in a new player and you create such big expectations, especially when it’s a foreign player, now when the team doesn’t do well, in those situations they look for ways to put the blame on somebody,” Fire coach Bob Bradley said.
And there was Kovalenko.
“When I left there, [ St. Pauli] officials said some bad things,” Kovalenko said. “They said they sent me home. They didn’t send me home. I wanted to come home.”
Kovalenko spent all of last Thursday and Friday on planes, flying from Hamburg to Milan to Chicago to Miami and finally to Guatemala, where he scored the only goal in the Fire’s opening-leg, 1-0 victory over Municipal in the CONCACAF Champions Cup.
Kovalenko said he’s happy to be home and with his teammates but he’s disappointed over how his dream ended up.
“I always wanted to be [in Europe],” he said. “I’m not going to lie. It’s a little disappointing. But I know if I continue to work hard here, maybe I’ll get another chance.”
