EAt the end of the 1980s, Darko Pancev was considered one of the most dangerous strikers in European football. After the collapse of Yugoslavia, he worked for Inter Milan, VfB Leipzig, Fortuna Düsseldorf and FC Sion. Today, the 56-year-old North Macedonian is a restaurateur in his hometown of Skopje, where he also served as technical director at his youth club Vardar.
Darko Pancev (left) with Michel Platini at a ceremony in 2006.
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Bild: picture-alliance/ dpa
The Reprezentazija caused a sensation with their sensational 1-0 victory in Italy. Did a lot of mastika schnapps flow afterwards in your café-restaurant?
People took to the streets with national flags and let their joy run free. It’s also not often that the reigning European champions and four-time world champions are deprived of a World Cup appearance, even though the Squadra Azzurra were playing in front of their home crowd.
A year ago, the North Macedonia team beat Germany 2-1 in the World Cup qualifying round, and now they’ve beaten Italy. That can’t be a coincidence, can it?
You can’t compare the two games. The Germany game was set against a ghostly backdrop as part of a qualifying round, while the win over Italy was achieved in a play-off semi-final. The fact is, however, that these achievements mark a turning point in the history of North Macedonian football, especially as we have had nothing to match to date apart from a rather sobering showing at last summer’s European Championship.
Football showed its cruel side to the Italians on Thursday: while they managed 32 shots, Blagoja Milevski’s team managed just four shots without taking a single corner kick. Did the football god mean too well with North Macedonia?
Luckily football is not always mathematics and has been writing the craziest stories for decades, which is why it has such a huge appeal. Of course, Italy was the clearly dominant team with the most game shares. It kind of overwhelmed us, but without winning. You can’t ignore the attitude and collective self-sacrifice of our team. It really drove the Italians to despair.
For years, record international Goran Pandev was the cornerstone of the North Macedonia team. Could it be that the end of his career triggered positive side effects in the ranks of the national team?
Goran Pandev’s contributions to North Macedonian football are undisputed. It shouldn’t be forgotten that his goal in the play-off game against Georgia propelled us to the European Championship. However, we also lost to Andorra once with him in the starting line-up. But I learned that after he left players like Elmas, Bardhi or Ademi can develop even more, which is very beneficial for the team image.
How do you rate the contribution of national coach Milevski, who succeeded Igor Angelovski after the EM?
If I were president of the association, I would immediately extend his contract for another four years. I am very impressed by his work and his concept, especially since he has previously done excellent work in the youth field. For me, he’s the best national coach we’ve had on the bench to date.
Will his motivational skills be enough to beat Portugal at the Estádio do Dragão this Tuesday (8:45 p.m. on DAZN)?
It’s going to be another battle, but this time the level of difficulty is a little higher, especially since Portugal is more heavily occupied than Italy in my opinion. They have four or five world-class players and a very experienced coach. But, as already mentioned, miracles happen all the time in football. We just have to believe in it and give the maximum for it. Regardless of the outcome, this team deserves the utmost respect for their achievements to date and still have a great future ahead of them.
