As the end of the domestic league season approaches, the outlines of the first two leagues for the next season are beginning to be drawn, and the second league, which could be filled with a bunch of teams from the capital, is currently looking particularly interesting.

Next season, the second league will have fewer teams than the current 16. This season 5 will be directly relegated, and only one will be promoted to the first league, while three teams from the top flight will be relegated to the second. In addition, three teams (9th, 10th and 11th place) will play a play-off with the five winners of the third league groups. The second and third-placed teams will also enter a play-off, but with two first league teams. Thus, next season, the second league will have 14 teams.

Currently, there are only two teams from Skopje in the second league, Skopje from Avtokomanda and Shkëndija 77 from Arachinovo. Arachinovo is actually a village near Skopje, but there is no stadium there, so Shkëndija 77 plays its matches in the Singjelikj neighborhood. Both are fighting for top flight promotion, chasing Bregalnica, which holds the top. Let’s imagine a scenario in which at the end of the season neither of these two teams will finish in first place, and if they play a playoff as second and third placed, they will lose it. In such a scenario, Shkëndija 77 and Skopje would stay in the second league for next season as well.

1/14 Skopje (Avtokomanda)
2/14 Shkëndija 77 (Arachinovo)

We are going to the first league. The team of Shkupi from the Chair neighborhood has already been relegated, which due to financial problems is playing with youth players this season and is breaking negative records. Let’s imagine (and hope) that Shkupi will not give up playing and will play in the second league next season, with whatever lineup.

3/14 Shkupi (Chair)

In the relegation zone in the first league with three rounds remaining are Rabotnichki from the famous Debar Maalo neighborhood and Makedonija GjP from Gjorche Petrov. Both teams have a chance to save themselves from direct relegation, but the most they can do is reach the playoffs against the second and third-placed teams from the second league. Let’s imagine a scenario in which both Rabotnichki and Makedonija GjP are relegated directly to the second league.

4/14 Rabotnichki (Debar Maalo)
5/14 Macedonia GjP (Gjorche Petrov)

The champion of the third league group north, where all teams located in and around Skopje belong, is Euromilk from Gorno Lisiche. This team has already booked a place in the play-offs for filling the second league. There, 8 teams will fight for 4 places: three from the second league, namely Kozhuf (Gevgelija), Teteks (Tetovo) and Sasa (Makedonska Kamenica), and the winners of the five third league groups, namely: Borec (Veles), Kamjani (Kamenjane), Vllaznimi (Struga), Euromilk (Skopje) and the winner of the group East (Pobeda from Valnadovo or Ovche Pole from Sveti Nikole). The play-off regulations state that the three second league teams cannot play against each other, which means that there will be three matches featuring second league teams against third league teams and one duel between two third league sides. Let’s imagine a scenario in which Euromilk is winner of the play-off and secures a place in the second league for the next season.

6/14 Euromilk (Gorno Lisiche)

Thus, as many as 6 out of 14 teams in the second league next season could be from Skopje. Otherwise, only one team, Vardar, would remain in the first league.

Whether this scenario, for which there is a real chance, will come true, remains to be seen, first after the weekend of May 23-24, when the final round in the first and second leagues is played, and then after the play-offs for filling these two leagues are played.

Six is ​​the Skopje record

It won’t be the first time that there have been six Skopje teams in the second league. There were exactly six in the 2007/08 season, but back then the second league had as many as 18 teams.

2007/08 (6/18): Alumina (Karposh), Lokomotiva (Karposh), Madjari Solidarnost (Madjari), Metalurg (Zhelezara), Skopje (Avtokomanda) and Sloga Jugomagnat (Chair).

There were six in a few more seasons, but then the second league was divided into two groups (East and West) and it was normal for there to be a much greater chance of having more teams from the capital. Such examples are the seasons:

1993/94 (6/14): Tehnokom (Gorno Lisiche), Madjari Solidarnost (Madjari), Metalurg (Zhelezara), Rabotnichki (Debar Maalo), Skopje (Avtokomanda) and Shkëndija (Arachinovo);

1994/95 (6/17): Makedonija (Gjorche Petrov), Madjari Solidarnost (Madjari), Metalurg (Zhelezara), Rabotnichki (Debar Maalo), Skopje (Avtokomanda) and Shkëndija (Arachinovo);

1999/00 (6/18): Alumina (Karposh), Balkan (Chair), Butel (Butel), Madjari Solidarnost (Madjari), Skopje (Avtokomanda) and Shkëndija (Arachinovo);