World Cup
Italy 0-1 North Macedonia: Trajkovski leaves European champions out of the World Cup
Aleksandar Trajkovski’s goal in extra time surprised the qualifiers as a 1-0 win against Italy saw North Macedonia qualify for the play-off final and the European champions remain eliminated from the World Cup for the second straight season.
From Hell to Heaven and back to Hell. Italy missed the 2018 World Cup, won Euro 2020 and will miss the 2022 World Cup! Aleksandar Trajkovski’s long shot into the delays wrote that 1-0 for North Macedonia at “Renzo Barbera” and has so far caused the big surprise of the barrage.
The “squadra azura” was better, but very wasteful in its possibilities and paid for it in the end. North Macedonia are preparing for their current battle against Portugal in Tuesday’s final in Porto for a place in Qatar.
Italy had the upper hand early on on the field, with the… blessing of the visitors. Their defensive function was quite good and their main goal was to block places for Lorenzo Insigne and Domenico Berardi.
A mistake by Stole Dimitrievski nearly ended the plan but the North Macedonia keeper’s pass to Berardi was denied by the Italian striker from Sassuolo.
This phase woke up the Italians, who became too dangerous, but Dimitrievski was quite focused from then on and beyond, keeping the first half from zero.
In the second part, the “Truppe Azura” continued to push and provided good moments. Berardi and Insigne when they went wide and when they fell victim to a good position from the opponent who blocked their efforts.
Giacomo Raspadori’s cross did little to alter the hosts’ accuracy, while Lorenzo Pellegrini and Sandro Tonali tried to keep the ball out of the North Macedonians’ box. Blagoja Milevski’s players continued to defend massively, but also correctly. Despite only having three finals in 90 minutes, they didn’t seem to care just to keep the zero.
They didn’t succeed. On the attack! A long-range effort from Trajkovski in the 2nd minute of delay defeated Gianluigi Donaroma 1-0 and caused… an invasion of the bench to celebrate. When the game started again, Italy had one last chance, but again a counter plan went awry.
1-0 was a fact. North Macedonia reached the final of the play-offs, where they meet Portugal in the ‘Dragao’, while Italy suffered their first defeat in World Cup qualifiers after 48 wins and 11 draws.
ITALY: Donaroma, Florenzi, Mancini (90′ Chiellini), Bastoni, Emerson, Barela (77′ Tonali), Zorginio, Verratti, Berardi (89′ Joao Pedro), Imobile (77′ Pellegrini), Insigne (64)
NORTH MACEDONIA: Dimitrievski, S. Ristovski, Velkovsky (86′ Ristevski), Musliu, Alioski, Tsurlinov, Antemi (59′ Askovski), Bardi, Nikolov (59′ Spirovski), M. Ristovsky (72′)
Sophia Jhon is a sports journalist and author. He has worked as a news editor for Sportish and is now a sport columnist for the same publication. Alberta’s professional interests lie largely in sports news, with an emphasis on English football. He has also written articles on other sporting topics.
World Cup
INFANTINO: “If there was no FIFA, there would be no football in 150 countries of the world”
FIFA President Gianni Infantino He commented on World Cup ticket prices, saying they reflected “absolutely insane” demand for next summer’s tournament:
“We have six to seven million tickets and in 15 days we received 150 million ticket requests. So every day we have 10 million requests. This shows how strong the World Cup is.”
FIFA has sold just 44 million tickets in almost 100 years of the World Cup. So we were able to sell tickets for the 300th anniversary of the World Cup in two weeks. Just imagine. “This is absolutely crazy.”
Infantino also noted that funds from ticket sales would be reinvested into world football, but did not specify a specific amount:
“The important thing is that the revenue from this goes back into football around the world. If it weren’t for FIFA, there would be no football in 150 countries of the world. Football exists thanks to the revenues we get from the World Cup, and we reinvest that into football around the world.”
Previously, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer called on FIFA to further reduce 2026 World Cup ticket prices.
Source: Sport UA
I am a writer at Sportish, where I mainly cover sports news. I’ve also written for The Guardian and ESPN Brasil, and my work has been featured on NBC Sports, SI.com and more. Before working in journalism, I was an athlete: I played football for Colgate University and competed in the US Open Cross Country Championships.
World Cup
VIDEO. The best scorer of the year in the Ukrainian national team has been announced. All targets
The Ukrainian Football Federation has determined the top scorer of the national team in 2025.
This status was given to Polesie’s winger Alexey Gutsulyak, who scored 5 goals and made 3 assists.
Gutsulyak’s assistance became important in the decisive matches of the autumn, when the player scored a goal and made an assist in the match against Azerbaijan, and also scored and assisted in the match against Iceland.
This helped the Ukraine national team reach the 2026 World Cup qualifying play-offs against Sweden in March.
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Source: Sport UA
I am a writer at Sportish, where I mainly cover sports news. I’ve also written for The Guardian and ESPN Brasil, and my work has been featured on NBC Sports, SI.com and more. Before working in journalism, I was an athlete: I played football for Colgate University and competed in the US Open Cross Country Championships.
Former Real Madrid midfielder Toni Kroos He talked about his interaction with Brazilian striker Vinicius Junior and other representatives of Brazil within the scope of the “royal club”.
“The Brazilians aroused my sympathy even as a child. While playing for Real Madrid, I developed excellent relationships with Vinicius, Casemiro and Militao.
It is very easy to find a common language with these guys: they know how to enjoy life, and their mentality is significantly different from that of the Germans.
Casemiro and Vinicius and I understood each other perfectly on the field and developed a unique football bond with Vini.
We communicated warmly in daily life. I believe that if there is no contact between players off the field, it is extremely difficult to achieve harmony in the game.
I used Vini’s high-speed bursts effectively and he masterfully directed my passes,” AS Kroos reports.
Let’s remember that Kroos defended the jersey of Real Madrid from 2014 to 2024. During this decade the German midfielder won the Champions League five times.
Source: Sport UA
I am a writer at Sportish, where I mainly cover sports news. I’ve also written for The Guardian and ESPN Brasil, and my work has been featured on NBC Sports, SI.com and more. Before working in journalism, I was an athlete: I played football for Colgate University and competed in the US Open Cross Country Championships.
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