In the last friendly before the European Championship Macedonia hammered Kazakhstan making positives vibes in the team before heading for Bucharest.
photo by FFM: both Milan Ristovski (L) & Darko Churlinov (R) celebrated their debut goals
Coach Igor Angelovski made 4 changes since Tuesday’s match against Slovenia and a bit changed the formation as this time the midfield consisted of one DM, two wings and two creative midfielders. Kire Ristevski, Stefan Spirovski, Tihomir Kostadinov and Ivan Trichkovski were given a chance from the start while Stefan Ristovski being repositioned as one of the trio defenders. Enis Bardhi one again tested positive so he missed this match again, while Ferhan Hasani injured his nose against Slovenia and was given a rest.
As expected, Macedonia started dominating right from the beginning. The Kazakhs fielded a combined team as their best played is doping banned and few others couldn’t arrive due to injuries.
Trichkosvki and Kostadinov had good chances in the opening half with the later fired a great shot that forced visiting keeper Pokatilov to make a good save.
In the 35th minute Elmas dribbled past Beysebekov in the box before being brought down for a penalty kick. Alioski stepped in and with a powerful shot broke the dead lock.
The penalty as seen from the stands:
Five minute before the break the visitors had their first attempt toward the Macedonian goal when Tagybergen fired a shot from distance, but Dimitrievski made a save.
In the injury time Tapalov made a naive brutal tackle on Ristevski and got sent off, leaving Kazakhstan with 10 men just before the break.
Ten minutes into the second half, after Trichkovski missed a header chance, Dimitrievski dropped the ball from his hands after a corner kick, but no Kazakh players were near by to seize the occasion.
Just a minute after that event Nikolov stole a ball, passed to Pandev who flipped the ball over the visiting defense to Kostadinov in the box who right away assisted to Trichkovski who doubled the lead.
Daniel Avramovski and Milan Ristovski substituted Pandev and Trichkovski, while later Aleksandar Trahjkovski and Darko Churlinov stepped in instead of Elmas and Kostadinov.
The 74th minute was underway when Trajkovski took a corner kick and found newly introduced Milan Ristovski who headed home scoring on his national team debut. The younger brother of Stefan definitely had a dream debut.
Milan’s goal as seen from the stands:
Just two minutes later another debut goal. Trajkovski dribbled past Suyumbayev and served Churlinov who scored with a sliding tackle between the legs of substitute keeper Seisen, making it 4:0.
Macedonia has had three more good chances, but no more goals were scored today.
Highlights:
The Macedonian team will now continue preparing in Skopje before heading for Bucharest on Tuesday morning. Our first match at the EURO is against Austria on the 13 at 18.00 CET.
Interesting facts regarding this match:
- 119th appearance for Goran Pandev.
- 65th cap for Stefan Ristovski and Aleksandar Trajkovski.
- 50th match for coach Igor Angelovski.
- 48 out of 54 UEFA national teams have now faced Macedonia.
- 45th cap for Ezgjan Alioski.
- 40th cap for Stefan Spirovski.
- 15th cap for Krste Velkoski.
- 10th cap for Tihomir Kostadinov.
- 8th goal for Ezgjan Alioski.
- 7th goal for Ivan Trichkovski.
- 4th converted penalty for Ezgjan Alioski.
- 1st cap & 1st goal for Milan Ristovski.
- 1st goal for Darko Churlinov.