It seems injuries happen at the worst opportune time for teams, just ask the English, who will be without Wayne Rooney, or the Italians, who lost Christian Vieri and Aimo Diana for the entire World Cup, and now you may be able to add the Ukraine to that daunting list.

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The Ukrainians are facing a lineup of injuries leading up to the 2006 World Cup but none are more significant than the one suffered by striker Andriy Shevchenko. The AC Milan star sprained his medial collateral ligament in a Serie A match with Parma on May 7th. The injury is expected to sideline the 2004 European Football Player of the Year for another two weeks but Shevchenko should be able to return in time for their opening match against Spain on June 14, which is good new for Coach Oleg Blokhin.

“Of course, with Shevchenko we have one team and without him it is quite another team," Blokhin said in an interview with Reuters.

Other players suffering from injury include, forward Andriy Vorobei, defender Serhiy Fyodorov and keeper Olexander Shovkovsky, who is just now getting back on the pitch trying to regain his form after breaking his collarbone in January.

"Unfortunately, the mood at the moment is not terribly good. In the qualifying games we had only one or two injured players but now we are beginning to feel the impact," Blokhin went on to say in the interview.

Ukraine, who is currently ranked 42 in the FIFA World Rankings, was the second European team, behind Germany to qualify for the tournament, topping a group that contained teams like Turkey, Denmark and Greece.

The Ukrainians first World Cup appearance has a lot to do with Shevchenko, who scored six of his team’s 18 goals during qualifying.

Placed in a Group H with Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, the only African team returning from the 2002 World Cup and consistent underachievers Spain, many have high hopes for the Ukrainians and have picked them to be one of the biggest surprises coming into the tournament.

Ukraine sits at 2/1 odds to win their group and 60/1 odds to win the World Cup. Spain is favored to win Group H at 4/7 odds, while Tunisia is 11/1 odds and Saudi Arabia is 30/1 odds to win the group.

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Ukraine will play more four more friendlies before they head to Germany. They meet fellow World Cup teams Costa Rica (May 28) and Italy (June 2), then finish off with Libya on June 5th and Luxembourg on June 8th.