Macedonia opened the 2021 World Cup qualifiers with a 3:2 defeat away to Romania despite coming back after being 2:0 down.
photo by UEFA: after the final goal
Since Darko Velkovski got a muscle injure coach Angelovski faced problems in the back line as Darko is the most important player because of his skills with the ball and the ability to organize the play connecting with the midfield. The coach opted for 3-4-1-2 formation choosing Ristevski, Musliu and Bejtulai in the defense.
Macedonia easily could have taken the lead after just 8 minutes when Alioski perfectly served Nestorovski, but the Serie A player stuck the ball between his legs failing to attempt a shot.
The hosts broke the dead lock in the 28th minute when Bejtulai failed to intercept a pass from captain Chiricheş to Tănase and the later scored past Dimitrievski.
Five minutes into the second half and Mihăilă score a beauty on his debut. He was a substitute today coming into play early into the match after Coman picked up an injury.
Boban Nikolov and Nicolae Stanciu; photo: UEFA
In that moment Angelovski decided to make a double change introducing Ademi and Stojanovski instead Nikolov and Nestorovski.
Eventually the Lynx found the back of the net 8 minutes from time when Alioski made a cross finding Ademi in the box who headed home.
In the very next minute a counter attack by Macedonian ended with Bardhi perfectly serving Trajkovski, who had taken the place of Pandev, and equalized on 2:2. It was his 16th national team goal with which he surpassed Artim Shakjiri on the overall goalscoring list as he now shares the 2nd place with Gjorgji Hristov.
And than, instead of pursuing a winner, disaster in the Macedonian box. The ball somehow got to newly introduced Ianis Hagi who scored between the legs of Ristovski what will be his debut national team goal. Ianis is the son of legend Gheorghe Hagi.
Ademi scored a last minute equalized, but the goal was ruled out for offside.
In the other matches of our group Germany, as expected, beat Iceland with 3:0, while Armenia collected the points away to Liechtenstein thanks to an own goal.
The next match for Macedonia is on Sunday against Liechtenstein in Skopje.
Interesting facts regarding this match:
- 115th match for Goran Pandev
- 40th match for Ezgjan Alioski.
- 40th match for Agim Ibraimi, first since 29.03.2016.
- 30th match for Boban Nikolov
- 16th goal for Aleksandar Trajkovski
- 5th defeat against Romania in the 6th encounter.
- 4th goal for Arijan Ademi.