Aside from the bouncing red shirts in the Rennes end and the fluorescent orange of Shakhtar Donetsk, two colours glowed above all through the biting cold of a Warsaw night.
Wherever you looked, it was blue and yellow. From merchandise stalls on the approach to Legia Warsaw’s stadium, to the majority of ‘home’ fans and even a few in the away end, the Ukraine flag was everywhere.
So when Dmytro Kryskiv, from Kharkiv, was assisted to score by Bogdan Mykhaylichenko, from Kyiv Oblast, this felt like a goal for Shakhtar but more for Ukraine.
‘Glory to Ukraine’ read some flags, which doubled up as blankets for many as Shakhtar returned to competitive action 937 miles north-west of Donetsk.
This was their first match since talisman Mykhaylo Mudryk moved to Chelsea for £88million in January, but they looked far from rusty.
Kryskiv opened the scoring before Artem Bondarenko doubled their lead from the penalty spot with the last kick of the first half.
The French side pulled one back on 59 minutes through Karl Toko Ekambi after fine work by 20-year-old Jeremy Doku.
Shakhtar’s boss Igor Jovicevic promised that his team would fight until the last seconds for all struggling back home and that’s what they did.
Bruno Genesio’s Rennes side grew in danger and confidence but could not break down the sturdy Ukrainian rearguard.