Dark of Macedon - the conqueror of the world
Darko Panchev set the ball at an 11-meter mark and a few seconds later struck hard at the right corner of the goal of Pascal Olmet. The goalkeeper of the Marseille “Olympic” jerked to the left, and only at the last moment extended his right hand towards the ball flying at the goal. It was a gesture of despair - the Macedonian striker had already raised his hands and ran to celebrate a goal scored with partners. Painted in red and white, the southern stand of the crowded San Nicola stadium in Bari turned into a volcano crater overnight - the merciless fight for the European football crown, which lasted more than two hours, ended in the triumph of the champion of Yugoslavia. That May night, Panchev and his comrades wrote down their names in football history - having outplayed the Marseilles in the penalty shoot-out, Crvena Zvezda became the first (and so far the only) European Champion Cup holder from the countries of the former Yugoslavia.
By the will of fate, seven months later, Pancev put an end to Belgrade’s climb to the world football Olympus with another accurate strike from 11 meters - having beaten the Chilean “Kolo-Kolo” in Tokyo 3-0, the wards of Vladovich Popovich won the Intercontinental Cup. The third goal, scored by the “black cobra” in the 72nd minute, was crowned by the truly epochal success of the team, in which there was not a single foreigner (except for an ethnic Serb with Romanian passport Miodrag Belodedich).
As time will tell, Tokyo's triumph was the peak of the career of Panchev - the most titled player in the history of Macedonian football. In addition to Darko, in Macedonia European and world club football titles can boast another player in the stellar “Stars” - the unyielding defender Ilia Najoski. However, Panchev’s track record is much richer. In the 1983/84 season (at the time of the end of the championship he was not yet 19!) He scored 19 goals and became the youngest winner of the scorers dispute in the history of Yugoslav football. Three 
years later, once again winning the scoring race, Panchev brought his native “Vardar” the first and only champion title of the “big” Yugoslavia (he will later be judged by the Belgrade “Partizan”, who scored more points during the championship than the Macedonian team, but started with 6 points fine for an allegedly negotiated match of the last round of the championship-85/86 - the court then rehabilitates the black-and-white ones, declaring these charges insolvent and declares them champions). Then came Panchev’s move to Belgrade, three consecutive titles (1990-92) as the country's champion and a triumph in the Yugoslav Cup (1990). In 27 matches for the Yugoslav national team, he scored 17 goals, 11 of which in the qualifying round for the 1992 European Championship. For three consecutive years, Panchev became the top scorer of the championship, and in 1991, with 34 goals, he won the dispute over the Golden Boot awarded to the most successful European football player by the French newspaper L'Equipe. However, Panchev could receive the award only last summer, from the hands of the French football legend Michel Platini. The reason for the 15-year delay is a protracted dispute with the Cyprus Football Federation, which claimed that the local player ahead of Panchev, scoring 40 goals. After years of investigation undertaken by L'Equipe itself, the newspaper's editors issued a verdict: The Golden Boot belongs to Pancev. Handing a prize to a player in the capital of Macedonia, Platini joked that it is very difficult to hand it over to a person who has deprived the French team of the continental championship.
In Europe, Panchev did not work out very well: in the Milan Inter, in the company of Uruguayan Sosa, adored by fans of the Sicilian Toto Skilachi and rising Dutch star Denis Bergkamp, Darko did not play enough. In addition, a career in Serie A was complicated by a series of injuries. Still, three goals in three Italian seasons (during which the striker played only 19 matches) is too little for the formidable scorer. Panchev played in the German “Dresden” and “Fortune” and the Swiss “Sion”, and at the end of his career he even managed to hold several matches for the national team of Macedonia. Despite the failures that haunted him abroad, Panchev remained the brightest star of Macedonian football in the memory of fans.
And this football gave a lot of talented players who, surpassing the local level in the class, basically replenished the ranks of the great four of Yugoslav football - Belgrade “Stars” and “Partizan” and Croatian “Dynamo” (Zagreb) and “Hajduka” (Split). Among those with whom Panchev won the Yugoslav gold of the year 87 from the greats, let us single out the already mentioned Naidoski, left winger Vasil Ringov, a great passer Tony Savevsky (four times becoming AEK champion of Greece) and defenders Dragan Kanatlarovsky and Vuyadin Stanoravichyevich, later respectively, in "Red Star" and "Partisan".
New Macedonia
The fate of the national team of Macedonia after the collapse of Yugoslavia was not easy. The level of the championship did not reach that of the union, and it was almost impossible to keep talented youth in the years when civil wars raged nearby. However, the situation in Macedonian football has not changed too much today. Of the 13 players on the Old Trafford turf in a recent qualifying match against England, all 13 are overseas. Local clubs cannot boast of multimillion-dollar budgets, therefore, it is practically impossible to maintain a good team without personnel losses for at least four to five seasons - the outflow of players is enormous, the country (as, incidentally, the rest of the republics of the former Yugoslavia) regularly supplies players to foreign markets .
Nevertheless, although the Macedonians did not yet have enough stars from the sky, they should not be ashamed of their football. Over the past 14 years, they spoiled a lot of favorites in European football, confirming the reputation of a tough nut, which, however, can sometimes crack some kind of football dwarf like Andorra.
After the collapse of the Yugoslav state, Macedonia did not immediately begin to participate in the most prestigious football tournaments. Politics intervened - the conflict over the name of the young Balkan state slowed down the process of integration of the Macedonians into European and world football. The Greek government persistently resisted the use of the name "Macedonia" and ultimately succeeded: the UN authorized the use of the name with the prefix "former Yugoslav republic", and this decision remains in force to this day. Accordingly, Skopje received membership in UEFA and FIFA only in 1994, after which the Macedonian team was immediately included in the list of countries that will compete for trips to the 1996 European Championships in England.
Favorite fourth row
In the debut debugging cycle, Andon Donchevsky's wards did not face the dirt, although one victory (over Cyprus at home) in 10 matches in a group where Armenia looked like an obvious outsider was probably not the maximum that the team from the Balkans was capable of. At the same time, the dark one patted the nerves of eminent rivals. In the match of the first round of the qualifying round in Skopje, the hosts lost two points to the Danes (1: 1), and in the third they took away two more from Belgium away (also 1: 1). Until the end of the cycle, the national team registered two away draws with Cyprus and Armenia in the register, and it demonstrated complete unpredictability, losing to the Armenians at home (1: 2). The Belgians for home failure severely evened in Skopje (5: 0), the leaders of the group Spaniards left the newcomers with two “bagels” (3: 0 and 2: 0), and the Danes won the ball in the Copenhagen revenge (1: 0). The result - the 4th place in the group, ahead of Cyprus and Armenia due to the best results in fights with them with absolutely identical indicators of victories, draws and defeats (1-4-5).
The draw for World Cup 98 in France brought the Macedonians into one group with Romania, Ireland, Iceland, Liechtenstein and Lithuania. Fans from the Balkans remembered him primarily for two games: an enchanting victory over the Irish in Skopje (3: 2) and the defeat of Liechtenstein fans away (11: 1 - the largest victory in an official match in the history of the Macedonian national team). There were still home victories over the same Liechtenstein (3: 0) and Iceland (1: 0) and a draw against the northerners in their field (1: 1). Macedonia lost the remaining five matches, including twice to Lithuania. The result - again 4th place, ahead of Iceland and Liechtenstein.
The next selection, for the 2000 European Championships in Belgium and Holland, the Macedonians spent unevenly, chalking up victories over an outsider, the Malta national team, and two draws - but what! First, in their field, two points of the bronze medalists of the World Cup 98 Croats (1: 1) were deprived, and in the last round, the Irish hopes for the first place in the group were buried - a goal scored by defender Goran Stavrevski in the last minute deprived Mick McCarthy of the team two points, which in the end, there wasn’t enough in the competition for a direct ticket to the Yugoslavs. Subsequently, the Turks finally uncoupled Ireland in the butt games from the European Championship-2000. The national team of Dragan Kanatlarovsky eventually took the usual 4th place. Only Malta was worse.
Selected at the 2002 World Cup of Macedonia was to be in the company of Sweden, Turkey, Slovakia, Azerbaijan and Moldova. The national team won the only victory at home over Azerbaijan (3-0), tied four matches and was beaten 5 times. The best match of the cycle is a draw (3: 3) on a visit to the Turks, who were seriously accelerated on the way to the bronze medals of the 2002 World Cup. The result - already the traditional 4th place - only Moldovans and Azerbaijanis looked at the backs of the Macedonians.
The first match of the qualifying round for the 2004 European Championship in Portugal was revealed by the “dwarf syndrome" of the Balkan national team - the very Liechtenstein, thanks to a goal from Michael Shtoklazy in the 93rd minute, was partially rehabilitated for 11 goals conceded six years earlier. 1: 1 in Vaduz is not the best start to the selection. Then came the expected home defeat (1: 2) from Turkey, after which the calendar indicated a trip to Southampton, to England led by Beckham. Oddly enough, the Macedonians did not agree to the "steering wheel". Apparently, having tested the tactical model of the game against the British teams in the Irish, the squad of Nikola Ilievsky imposed his football on Sven-Goran Ericsson's wards and in the first half twice came forward. The British caught up, but failed to overtake. After the Southampton draw, the national federation issued the players a record prize for a small country of 6 thousand euros. As it turned out, it was the peak of the qualifying campaign - then relatively predictable defeats followed in meetings with the Turks, the British and Slovaks, revenge was taken from Liechtenstein (3: 1), and a draw was won against Slovakia (1: 1) in the last match that did not solve anything tour. The result is the 4th (and what else?) Place, a line above the Liechtenstein cellar inhabitants.
English specialization
In the football annals of the qualifying round for the 2006 World Cup in Germany, the Macedonian national team inscribed their name in traditionally irregular handwriting. First, she took away two points from the Dutch team that was smashing everyone to the brim under the leadership of Marco van Basten (2: 2 in Skopje). Then she was embarrassed in Andorra (0: 1) and could not score her even at home (0: 0)! Amply inferior to the Czechs (1: 6) and Finns (1: 5) on the road, and in the last round she again hung the lock on the gate and stole a point at the “orange” (two draws with the Macedonians and limited the loss of points to the Dutchmen who won all the other 10 matches in Group!). Having overcome the tournament distance, the Macedonians must have been a little confused: instead of the usual fourth, they first came in fifth place, ahead of Armenia and Andorra. The Andorran failures forced Dragan Kanatlarovsky to resign as head coach and cede him to Slovenian Srechko Katanets.
In the current qualifying tournament, which will continue on November 15 for them with a home game against the Russian team, the Macedonians again appeared as a team that could confuse plans for any opponent. Thanks to the ball of Crouch, the British took away from Skopje three points in the match, where, by their own admission, they barely pulled one. But in the Manchester revenge, the wards of Srechko Katanets were not timid and again surprised the islanders. The British media described the goalless draw against Macedonia as "the end of Steve McLaren’s honeymoon." If journalists rushed to conclusions, then the headlines came up a bit later, after losing to the Croats in Zagreb.
In the homeland of football, they did not expect a repeat of the Southampton incident, but the Katanets team showed character and demonstrated that it was not necessary to earn a point on the favorite field by “parking the bus” in front of their own goal. The Macedonians attacked and did this very sharply, several times were close to scoring. They could have missed, at the end of the match after the strike, Gerrard helped out the crossbar, but no one would turn his tongue to say that the guests took the point undeservedly.
Against the Russians, they will also go on the attack, driven by fans who, no doubt, will fill the 18-thousandth Gradsky to failure. Paradoxically, this is the chance for the team of Guus Hiddink - the Katanets football philosophy “play it yourself and let it play another” completely contributes to revealing all the charms of the game model, which the Dutchman is trying to build in working with the Russian team.
Boyan SHOCH