Having come into the qualification on the back of a tremendous European Championships in West Germany during the summer of 1988, the Soviets looked to emphasise their pre-qualification favourites tag. They had been a major international force during the entire decade, though they had ultimately failed to deliever despite their great promise. No less than qualification was expected from them, and most would surely deem it a failure should they fail to win the group.

With the backbone of the team still made out of that exciting crop of Dinamo Kiev players which had thrilled the audience back in 1986, when they had demonstrated some enterprising and attacking football during the Cup Winners’ Cup campaign, where they’d ultimately claim the title through a 3-0 final win against Atlético Madrid, much of the same had again been expected from them. However, this time around they would be a more mundane outfit, despite eventually claiming that top position.

They would show a level of indifference in their only pre-qualifying friendly, a 0-0 away draw with neighbouring minnows Finland, and despite having available to them nearly all the players who had excelled during the summer’s continental championship, they would fail to captive the audience like they had done on so many occasions previously. Was repeating previous displays of fine counter-attacking football beyond the current generation? The qualification would reveal how there appeared to be a need for fresh blood. A few players simply failed to reach their top level. Despite finishing two points ahead of the runners-up, it had far from been a convincing Soviet qualification campaign. In such a statement rested also a lot of pressure for this crop of players not just to win, but to do so with dominating performances.

They’d got off to a drab start through a highly forgettable 1-1 draw in Iceland, where the hosts had been the better side. They’d improve when they appeared at home for the first time, which was against a young Austrian side still finding their feet at this level. Inbetween their first two qualifiers, their Olympic tournament squad had returned home with gold medals, no less, after triumphing 2-1 in the final in South Korea, and so, surely a further few players had made sure to put pressure on the established ones, wanting to force their way into the full international squad. By the end of the qualification, half of the Seoul squad, no less than ten players, had appeared in at least one of the eight qualification squads. Midfield dynamo Aleksey Mikhailichenko had been the big Soviet star during the Olympics, but young forward Igor Dobrovolsky had truly come to the fore with a return of six goals, even scoring in all three cup stage matches.

The Soviet Union would resume qualification duties in late April with a routine 3-0 home win against a shaken East German outfit, and Dobrovolsky, in his first qualification start, notched the opener. He would remain a starter through until the end of the qualification, but generally manager Lobanovsky failed to unearth new gems to a side which had often looked stale, devoid of enthusiasm and ideas, even if they had always been difficult to break down defensively. A few players had already moved abroad by autumn in 1988, and it wasn’t always so that the often inspirational Aleksandr Zavarov, now with Juventus in Italy’s Serie A, had left the greatest impression when returning to the national team.

While the Soviets looked highly familiar during the qualification, there had also been some injury trouble, not least to stalwart defender Anatoly Demyanenko, something which had forced the manager into new ideas at full-back. 26 year old Lokomotiv Moscow defender Sergey Gorlukovich had done terrifically well as libero during the Olympics, and this had rewarded him with a more or less regular berth in the full international squad. He’d typically be seen as the left-back, while another newbie, the enthusiastic Oleg Luzhny, had also made his way into the squad.

One of their most impressive performances during the qualification was the 1-0 win in Istanbul against a Turkish team which had done well in two wins against East Germany. However, they would give a dross of a performance in the subsequent 1-1 home draw with Iceland, where they’d have to see the visitors claim a late leveller. The Soviet Union had never lost a World Cup or European Championships qualifier on home soil, and although they were never really in danger of doing so against Iceland, too, a draw was almost on par with defeat. They would follow this up with another bore draw, a 0-0 clash against potential runners-up Austria in Vienna, before succumbing to a revitalised East Germany by 2-1 in Karl-Marx-Stadt, despite going ahead late on through leading scorer Litovchenko, who had notched his third goal of the ongoing campaign. That result even enabled the Soviets to miss out on the World Cup altogether should they fail badly against Turkey in their final match, coupled with getting other results against them.

The USSR won 2-0 against a depleted Turkey in their final game, and they did so whilst returning to at least some of their more enterprising brand of football, bringing in a proper wide player along the left hand side in Ivan Yaremchuk, whilst Dobrovolsky had been allowed a more central position as a roving inside left midfielder. This had made them less predictable, and though leaving their two goals late, they had not been truly put to the sword by the Turkish. Ultimately, they had done what had been expected of them, although not much else.