Football
67th ranked North Macedonia stop Italy from 2022 World Cup
Published By
Kazeem Ugbodaga
Date
24th March, 2022
Quick Read
Italy, 5th in FIFA ranking, needed to win a play-off against 67 ranked North Macedonia to qualify for the final stage of qualifying for the World Cup but they lost 0-1 to the minor.
Minor North Macedonia have pulled up one of the biggest shocks, stopping European Champions, Italy from qualifying for the 2022 World Cup in Doha, Qatar.
Italy, 5th in FIFA ranking, needed to win a play-off against 67 ranked North Macedonia to qualify for the final stage of qualifying for the World Cup but they lost 0-1 to the minor.
Aleksandar Trajkovski was the hero of the match as he scored the only goal of the match on added time.
Trajkovski lashed the ball with incredible pace and power into the bottom left corner.
Italy dominated possession but it amounted to nothing as they could not score any goal.
Earlier on 20 minutes, Italy wasted opportunity to open scoring as Domenico Berardi found some space inside the box and got in a strike, but the shot was brilliantly blocked by one of the defending players sliding in.
Ciro Immobile, a minute later, wasted a golden opportunity inside the box by shooting straight into the back of an opponent when the goal was at his mercy.
Berardi wasted another opportunity to put Italy ahead, as he unleashed a powerful low shot from the centre of the box, but Stole Dimitrievski made a decent save to thwart him.
On 58 minutes, Berardi received a neat pass inside the box with his back to goal, swiveled and hit a powerful shot that went narrowly over the crossbar.
Tags:
Italy North Macedonia
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