Viktor Serdeniuk calls it his “lucky ticket” and not a day goes by where he doesn’t think about it.
It was late February and the Ukrainian winter was biting hard. But the freezing temperatures were the last thing on anyone’s mind. Airstrikes rocked Odesa early on February 24, the first day of Russia's ongoing invasion of Ukraine.
Serdeniuk, now a midfielder with Shamrock Rovers, woke his wife Natalia the moment the shelling of their city began. Their four month old son, Alex, was still asleep, but at the forefront of their thoughts.
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Leading up to that day, the young couple had discussed contingency plans if Russia carried through on their threats. But this was no drill.
“Overnight you wake up with shelling over your house and I still don’t know how to describe it with words other than to say it was terrifying,” says Serdeniuk. “You wake up in a different reality. The whole day, all you hear is bombing and shooting. We have zero understanding of what war is and it's scary.
“Now, you see the news and you understand what is happening, where the bombing is taking place and how to hide from it. But we woke up that morning with a rocket flying overhead.”
Serdeniuk continued: “We tried to go to Lviv as we’ve relatives there. Lviv seemed to be a little more protected, but we got halfway and heard a lot of shelling. Everyone on the road was turned around and made to go home. Back in our house, we didn’t know what to do.”
Serdeniuk, 26, had a contact at a Moldovan club and reached out. The plan was for Natalia and Alex to stay with friends of friends there until they figured out a plan.
The Moldovan border is only an hour’s drive from Odessa so they packed some belongings into their car, along with their French Bulldog ‘Chucky’.
Men can only leave Ukraine in exceptional circumstances, so Serdeniuk - playing for Balkany Zorya at the time - knew he would be saying goodbye to his family, for now. “We queued at the border for over 30 hours,” he explains. “It was very hard with a child in the car, in the middle of winter. But adrenalin gets you through.
“The queue of cars was 6km long. I don’t know how many people were in line, but it was a lot. Alex couldn’t sleep in the car, only outside in the buggy but it was freezing.”
Processing the border applications was painstakingly slow but eventually Serdeniuk and his family were six cars from the top of the line. Still, he had another three or four hours to kill and, trying to get Alex to sleep, he got out and pushed the buggy up to border guards.
He wanted to check what documentation Natalia and Alex needed, just to ensure it was all in order when their time finally came. Serdeniuk - speaking to us through an interpreter - recalled: “A lot of men who carried their kids to the border were on the floor crying, begging to leave.
“They were not allowed. I asked the woman behind the counter what my wife and son needed. But then she asked for my documents. I showed her my passport.
“She said '’Do you see the woman standing in front of you with the two kids? She is now your wife and now you have three kids'.
“Men with three children under-18 can leave Ukraine. She gave me back my passport and said ‘go quickly with your son, and join that family. They are now your family’.
“I was fully expecting to go back to Odesa but that woman made up a story so I could leave. That’s why I call it my lucky ticket.”
Natalia, and Chucky, were still on the Ukrainian side. It took another three hours before she got through but Serdeniuk and Alex were there waiting.
Serdeniuk said: “We slept the night and the next morning we asked a Moldovan policeman where to find a shop as I had nothing with me. But we started talking about the war. He said he and his family were packing their bags to leave Moldova as they feared being next.
“That's why we got back in the car and drove.” Stops were made in Germany and France but Natalia, a model, knew a photographer in America who put them in touch with a good friend in Cork.
“It was an amazing offer and we couldn’t say no,” said Serdeniuk, once a Ukraine youth international and team-mate of Arsenal star Oleksandr Zinchenko.
Once settled, Serdeniuk’s mum came to visit them in Ireland but returned to Ukraine as she had no intention of leaving her husband. Natalia’s mother and her younger brother and sister came to join them too, but her brother has since gone back to Ukraine.
Football in Ukraine was suspended following the invasion and the owners of Serdeniuk’s club, Balkany Zorya, had to pause payments to players. “The owners are farmers,” he said. “When the war started, the borders were closed and they couldn't sell their produce and make money.”
In Ireland, Serdeniuk went in search of employment and, armed with new football boots, trained with Cork City for three weeks. But the Rebels were siding with youth as they focused on winning the First Division and there was no deal on the table.
Serdeniuk also trained with Cobh Ramblers, but the commute was too much and he wanted to play at a higher level. An agent lined up a trial with Shamrock Rovers and with the European group stages looming, Stephen Bradley offered him a short-term deal until the end of the season.
Appearances have been hard to come by with just two substitute outings in the league and another in Europe. But at Tallaght Stadium last Sunday night, Serdeniuk had a league winners’ medal around his neck.
Draped in a giant Ukraine flag and holding the league trophy, he posed for pictures with Natalia and Alex, who is now one. “The way they have accepted me, it feels like I've been playing here for a few years. All of the boys and the coaches have supported me every day,’ says Serdeniuk.
“When I heard there was a chance to join this team I was really surprised. I was actually a little bit worried. Why? Because they are the champions of Ireland and I missed a lot of the season. I really wanted to use this chance.
“The language barrier is a really difficult one if I'm honest. But the boys are trying to talk to me even using sign language and their hands.
“They ask how I’m doing and how my family is doing. There are times where I forget about the language barrier because they make such a good effort with me.
“My old team-mates in Ukraine, many of them stayed at home and have new babies and they are stuck without football, without work. Some had time to find themselves new teams in Ukraine, and some didn't. Some gave up football to work elsewhere.
“For me, Ireland is probably the best country in the world in how they have treated Ukrainians who arrived here. I talk to my friends in other countries and the way Ireland treats people here, I don't hear it in other countries.”
Shamrock Rovers’ season draws to a close tomorrow when they finish their league season against UCD and, with it, Serdeniuk is technically a free agent again. He doesn’t know if Rovers will keep him on and may well be the player we never knew. But, by his own admission, he doesn’t plan too far in advance these days.
“There’s no point planning,” he says. “I've seen how life can change overnight, so plans are irrelevant at the moment.
“One day I had everything, a great team where I was captain, great conditions, but overnight and the following morning we had nothing. What I really hope is that my child never feels or sees what the children stuck in Ukraine saw and had to endure.
“Hopefully we’ll have great stories to tell Alex when he’s older about how Ukraine won when he was a little boy.”
Serdeniuk is softly spoken but leaning back in his chair from the table we’re sitting at, his arms are outstretched. “I'm proud of my country,” he says. “I’m proud of our people. I’m proud of our warriors who are fighting and I’m proud of our President.
“It’s impossible to quantify in words, but I hate the Russian army and I hate the government of Russia. It's a powerful pain.”
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