WARSAW, Poland. October 13 (PSN) – The Polish national team defeated North Macedonia 2:0 in UEFA EURO 2020 qualifying and have officially qualified for the tournament next summer.
Jerzy Brzeczek’s side continued their campaign at the Warsaw stadium on Sunday in good spirits after a win over Latvia last week. Meanwhile, Macedonia were also keen on another win after having collected 6 points from their last two outings.
With the Bialo-czerwoni only needing one more win to reach the UEFA EURO 2020 finals, they knew anything but 3 points tonight would not be acceptable.
Poland started the game on a strong note, consistently applying pressure to the Macedonian defense and looking for every possible chance to take a shot on net. Despite this, the Pole’s lacked the essential final touch needed to take control of the game.
Early in the half, Piotr Zielinski could had broken the deadlock with a ferocious shot from within the 18-yard box. However, the shot went a little high and hit the cross bar instead. This ended up being Poland’s best chance to score in the first half.
In the end, it took 74 minutes for the home team to make their breakthrough but it came. It all started with Robert Lewandowski, who cut inside the penalty box and before he could shoot, newly substituted Przemyslaw Frankowski stole in and poked the ball through the legs of Macedonia’s Stole Dimitrievski to make it 1:0.
6 minutes later, another substitute, Arkadiusz Milik, made it 2:0 with a fine long distance strike and cement Poland’s victory and qualification.
North Macedonia are now 5 points off second-placed Austria, whom they must beat next in Vienna. Jerzy Brzeczek’s team will face Israel and Slovenia next month with the intention of holding their first place spot until the end.
________________________________
Poland – North Macedonia 2:0 (0:0)
Goals: Frankowski 74′, Milik 80′
Yellow carded: Bednarek, Szymański, Reca – Pandev, Nikolov, Nestorovski, Spirovski, Alioski, Musliu
Referee: Antonio Miguel Mateu Lahoz (Spain) Attendance: 52 894
Poland: 1. Wojciech Szczęsny – 18. Bartosz Bereszyński, 15. Kamil Glik, 5. Jan Bednarek, 2. Arkadiusz Reca – 19. Sebastian Szymański (68, 7. Arkadiusz Milik), 6. Jacek Góralski, 10. Grzegorz Krychowiak, 20. Piotr Zieliński (90, 23. Krzysztof Piątek), 11. Kamil Grosicki (73, 21. Przemysław Frankowski) – 9. Robert Lewandowski
North Macedonia: 1. Stole Dimitrievski – 13. Stefan Ristovski (81, 11. Marjan Radeski), 6. Visar Musliu, 4. Kire Ristevski – 15. Egzon Bejtulai, 16. Boban Nikolov (88, 17. Ǵorǵi Stoilov), 20. Stefan Spirovski, 21. Elif Elmas, 8. Ezǵan Alioski – 10. Goran Pandev, 23. Ilija Nestorovski (73, 9. Aleksandar Trajkovski)
For breaking stories and all the great banter like us on Facebook: facebook.com/psnfutbol
Facebook
Twitter
YouTube
RSS