Euro 2012: 10 Biggest Goals of Andriy Shevchenko's Career

Andriy Shevchenko first announced himself for Italian giants AC Milan and to the world on 3rd October, 1999 on match day five in the 1999/2000 season of the Serie A. Milan were away at Lazio, who had raced away to an early 3-1 lead by the 38th minute. Little did the world bank on one man turning it around so quickly and in such style.

Andriy Shevchenko scored a hat-trick in the space of 25 minutes between the 43rd and the 68th minute to turn the game on its head. Shevchenko brought Milan to what was a winning position at 4-3, but couldn't prevent it ending at 4-4. The spoils might have been shared but the man for whom Milan shelled out a then record $25 million had come of age.

Still only 23 when he moved to AC Milan, Shevchenko had come from Dynamo Kyiv after having played and performed in the Ukranian Premier League. This sterling performance was a sign of things to come. Here are 10 of the biggest goals scored by Sheva, as he is also popularly known by sometimes.  

Shevchenko scored one of the two goals in Dynamo Kyiv's round of 16 match against Manchester City on 10th March, 2011. Kyiv won 2-0. Manchester City could only manage a 1-0 win in the return leg and Shevchenko's goal proved decisive. This goal would have given Andriy some satisfaction as he had helped his team eliminate an English opposition. Shevchenko is known to have flopped in the English league in most parts of the world and this would have surely been sweet revenge.  

Andriy Shevchenko has always been pivotal to the footballing aspirations of the Ukrainians. On 6th September 2008, Shevchenko scored a penalty against Belarus in stoppage time after coming on as a substitute in the 74th minute. The goal gave Ukraine a vital three points.

In the same campaign, Shevchenko also scored a crucial away goal against the Croatians to earn his side a 2-2 draw and a valuable point. All these efforts were rewarded with a playoff round with Greece that Ukraine eventually lost and could not qualify for the World Cup in 2010. 

At number eight in the list of biggest goals scored by Sheva is the winner against FC Porto in the 2003 UEFA Super Cup. The Super Cup is played between the winners of the UEFA Champions League and the UEFA CUP (Europa League) winners. Shevchenko scored the only goal in the game and was also the man of the match. 

It is always important to get off to a good start in big football tournaments at the world stage where there are only three group games before the knockout stages. Ukraine, as one of the hosts were given a brief reality check when Ibrahimovic scored for Sweden in the first group game of pot D at Euro 2012 against the Ukranians in the 52nd minute.

Shevchenko made sure that Ukraine left with not only a point, but all three by scoring in the 55th and 61st minutes. Ukraine won 2-1 and with it went atop of pot D with all three points. Ukraine might go a long way on the back of this result. Sheva's future goals in this tournament might be rated higher than these two depending on how far Ukraine go. For the moment, these two goals are combined as the seventh biggest moment for Shevchenko to score in his career.

Shevchenko scored a vital away goal against FC Porto in the Round of 16 game in the Champions League of the 2006/07 season. Chelsea won the home leg 2-1 and the vital goal provided to them by Shevchenko proved very important indeed. 

Andriy Shevchenko was at it yet again on the 10th of April 2007 at the La Mestalla, the home ground for Valencia football club. Chelsea had drawn its home leg 1-1 against Los Che and fell behind in the 32nd minute of the return leg thanks to Fernando Morientes' 32nd minute goal.

Shevchenko stepped up again and provided the equalizer in the 52nd minute. Just when the tie seemed to be heading into extra time, Shevchenko also turned provider for Essien to score late on to clear the path towards the semis for the Blues.  

In the 2003-04 season of the Serie A, AC Milan and AS Roma were two of the teams contesting for the title. Milan won convincingly in the end, but had the game at the San Siro against Roma towards the end of the season gone the other way, who knows what might have happened.

Andriy Shevchenko made sure that the result of such a crucial match went in his team's favor by scoring the only goal of the game in the second minute itself. If Roma had won that game, the tables would be turned by a massive six points. The 11 point difference by which Milan won in the end would have been cut short to five with still a few games to go. 

Ukraine are one of the lesser known teams who have been to a World Cup quarter final. In 2006, this was made possible by winning against Tunisia in the final group game after having lost 4-0 to Spain and won 4-0 against Saudi Arabia in the other two group games. 

Andriy Shevchenko scored the only goal of this game through a controversially won penalty by Shevchenko himself.  

AC Milan vs. Inter Milan, the Milan derby as it is known, was one of the mouth-watering semis in the Champions League season of 2002/03. Sadly, the Italians went the Italian way and made sure that the tie did not have many goals. The first leg ended 0-0 when San Siro was playing home for AC Milan.

When the San Siro was playing home for Inter Milan, Andriy Shevchenko came to the party and scored near the 45 minute mark. Obafemi Martins did equalize for Inter in the dying stages to test a few nerves of the Milan supporters, but AC Milan eventually held fort. The away goal rule saw them reach the finals where they would play Juventus, another Italian team from the Serie A. 

As life would have it, Andriy Shevchenko's biggest goal that he has ever scored will surprisingly never be given to him as a goal that he scored in the record books. Goals scored in penalty shootouts are not counted in your records. Only penalties scored in normal or extra time are. 

Shevchenko scored the decisive final penalty kick in the 2002/03 Champions League final against Juventus that saw the AC Milan supporters, players and staff disperse into celebration and run around joyous.

Football is such a great sport though, that two years later, this same Shevchenko missed the decisive penalty kick in a similar situation when he had to score to keep his team from losing the final.