Saudi Arabia coach Marcos Paqueta refused to blame the wet conditions during his side's 4-0 thrashing at the hands of Ukraine for their capitulation in Hamburg yesterday.

Goals from Andriy Rusol, Serhiy Rebrov, Andriy Shevchenko and Maksym Kalinichenko put the Saudis to the sword and, despite the tricky conditions, the Brazilian knew his side was beaten by the better team.

"We knew it was going to rain, or that there was a 50-50 chance it would rain," said Paqueta, who led Brazil to the world under-17 and under-20 championships. "It was unfortunate.

"We don't have a lot of rain in Saudi Arabia and so it's not easy to play on the wet ground. It created more difficulties. It was like Ukraine found in the first game when they had to play in the heat.

"But it's not an excuse because the most important thing was conceding the first goal at the beginning of the game and the third goal at the beginning of the second half."

The Saudis were up against it soon after kick-off as Rusol opened the scoring with barely four minutes on the clock from a corner by Kalinichenko, and with nine minutes remaining in the half Rebrov made it 2-0 with a long-range effort that outfoxed Saudi keeper Mabrouk Zaid.

Shevchenko then hit the killer blow just seconds after the restart when he headed home Kalinichenko's free-kick before the Chelsea striker turned provider, setting up man-of-the-match Kalinichenko in the 84th minute to round off a well-deserved victory.

Despite his impressive showing, Kalinichenko claimed the win was down to the Ukrainians playing well as a unit.

"All of the Ukraine players are one team and I think it's the entire team that allowed us to score this victory," said the Spartak Moscow midfielder.

"We were able to balance everything out again with this result and we are back to square one. We have scored as many goals as we have conceded."

Ukraine coach Oleg Blokhin, meanwhile, did not see the win as a sign of better things to come from his team.

"If I tell you that this is the maximum this team can achieve then that would not be very good," he said. "I have to take account of the mistakes made in this match. The problems are not going to diminish in size."