Metall Kherson saw off Probi Horodenka 3:1 in the Second Round of the First League on Friday. The hosts moved clear of the drop zone with a result that felt earned rather than handed over. To be fair, Probi rarely threatened to turn things around after going behind twice in the opening half.
Daniil Prykhodko opened the scoring from the spot in the twenty-seventh minute after a foul went unpunished in the build-up. Daniel Vernattus doubled the lead three minutes later, finishing off a quick transition down the left. Vernattus added his second in the thirty-seventh, and Metall had a comfortable cushion by then. The visitors responded with a penalty of their own when Maksym Girnyi converted from the mark in the forty-fifth minute, but the damage was already done.
Probi picked up two bookings in five minutes around the break, Orest Lepskyi among them, and the momentum shifted again in the second half. Metall substituted Maxim Borysenko in the forty-sixth, trying to manage the game rather than extend the lead. Maksym Orikhovskyi went off in the sixty-fifth after picking up a second yellow, and the hosts began to see out the result with increasing confidence. Danilo Honcharuk made way in the seventy-fifth as Metall turned it on defensively.
Things came to a head in the eighty-third minute when Girnyi collected a straight red card, leaving Probi with ten men and one foot in trouble. Metall brought on Daniil Prykhodko in the eighty-sixth, then Vernattus himself in the eighty-ninth, cycling fresh legs into the final minutes. Ilya Hryshchenko picked up a yellow in the ninetieth-plus-one, and the visitors had nothing left to offer. Metall held every card at this stage and finished comfortably.
Metall Kherson sit sixth with ten points from six games, three wins, one draw and two losses. Probi Horodenka remain sixteenth with just two points, having lost four of six and drawn twice. The hosts end a barren spell against bottom-half opposition, while Probi's struggles continue to mount. The gap between them widens further after this result.