The manager of the U21 team, Boban Babunski, held a press conference today about the upcoming qualifiers against Faroe Islands and Denmark.

The first game for Macedonia U21 is on 11 October against Faroe Islands while four days later, the team hosts Denmark, with both games at the Boris Trajkovski stadium in Skopje.  Babunski said the focus and priority must be on first beating Faroe Islands as opposed to looking ahead to the Denmark game.  The manager said a convincing victory against Faroe Islands could provide a boost for the much harder game against Denmark who Babunski considers the strongest team in the group.

Babunski also stated, “It’s good that we gave no injuries on the current team.  That means most of the players who we have worked with over the past year are available with the exception of Ferhan Hasani, who will train with the senior national team over the next three days before he joins the U21 team on Saturday in anticipation for the game against Denmark.  That was the wish of John Toshack and we will respect that because the senior national team should always be given priority, regardless if you are talking about a qualifier or friendly.”

Babunski then explained the Hasani controversy from a month ago when John Toshack felt he was lied to after being told that Hasani was injured but then he played for the U21 team in the match against Serbia.  Babunski said Hasani did not make the trip to Armenia for the senior national team because of an injury during the preparations but several days later, Hasani expressed a wish to help the U21 team in any way he can against Serbia and even scored a goal.

Babunski closed by defending Toshack who he called an experienced coach with a plan.  Babunski noted, “Once Toshack gets to know the players pretty good and gives chances to all of the potential internationals, he will select about 20 of them for the start of the 2014 World Cup qualifications.