North Macedonia 1999-2002 Home, matchworn v Turkey
North Macedonia 2016-22 Home, matchworn/prepared Eljif Elmas
The classic Puma template with the stripes across the sleeves and chest (sleeve stripes even on the rear). The yellow and red combination works with, with the white as a separator being surprisingly reasonable. Similar colour scheme up at the collar to help liven that up a little too. Main attraction though? Absolutely the old badge, with the flag plus the detail to it for a very interesting final look.
Used for a while, the main qualifiers the shirt was used in were for the 2002 World Cup. They managed a home win and away draw against Azerbaijan, two draws against Moldova and a surprise 3-3 away draw in Turkey to generate their 7 points. Their other 5 matches were lost a total of 9-0, losing home and away to Slovakia and Sweden. Had they converted a few draws into wins, it would’ve been a reasonable campaign, but the low points total left them very near the bottom, barely edging out Azerbaijan and Moldova in the race for 4th.
The shirt everyone knows! Yes, there are the lines down the front and the rear (very slimming), the shiny badge, the traditional Jako shoulder pattern and a rear flag, but nobody will pick up on those much. The shirt is made by the giant flag pattern spraying the Sun’s rays out from under the FA logo, making it a great flag shirt and a great shirt. I could say more about it, but it is more interesting to just look at it.
When wasn’t this shirt used? Extremely long lasting it saw use across a number of campaigns, with the most notable being their Euros debut in 2020 (2021). They opened up against Austria with a 3-1 loss, Pandev’s calamitous equaliser giving them hope until 2 late goals went in. Next up were Ukraine, but their second Euros goal proved to be a consolation again, in a 2-1 loss. Finally came the Dutch and a 3-0 loss swept them aside. They weren’t the worst team at the Euros, and that was enough of an aim, but it was very close.
Typically North Macedonia are towards the lower end of UEFA, always grabbing at least a win and a draw, with only 2014 World Cup and Euro 2016 qualifications landing them in last place in their qualifying group. While respectable, they were never the sort of team you could see qualifying. The inaugural Nations League season gave them their chance, winning their League D group and making it to Euro 2020 through the play-offs! Since then they’ve been stable in League C of the Nations League so relied on skill alone to reach the 2022 World Cup play-offs, narrowly beating out Romania in a very close run group. They fell short in the end, having spectacularly eliminated Italy. However, despite a poor 2024 set of qualifiers, they shan’t be taken lightly again soon!
Ranked near the bottom of UEFA for women’s football, their national team has little to their name. Positive results in qualifications to date have been rare, even leading to their withdrawal from 2019 World Cup qualifiers. They’ve registered a handful of results against other low ranked sides, but their solitary point in the inaugural women’s Nations League season shows that improvement is slow. In men’s youth football their solitary Euros appearance comes from the U21s, who narrowly managed to qualify in a tough fight with France and Iceland for Euro 2017, though they managed only a draw with Serbia at the tournament itself. Otherwise their youth teams are much like the senior team, typically towards the lower end of the table, with some great individual performances scattered in the middle. The women’s youth teams in recent years have had more positive results against fellow League B team but, as with qualifiers before the A/B split, struggle immensely against better teams. The U19s hosted the 2010 Euros and lost all 3 games by at least 5 goals. Some progress, but still plenty of work to be done.
Regulars in futsal, North Macedonia remain towards the bottom end of UEFA, without any Euros or World Cup qualifications (even at U19 level). They tend to be ranked highly enough to be between the preliminary and main qualifying rounds though, so there are plenty of decent results from them, they’re just yet to translate them into tournaments. Women’s futsal is not an avenue they’ve explored to date and neither is beach soccer.
Given an outside chance at a play-off spot for 2022 qualifiers, North Macedonia took full advantage. A shock victory over Germany gave them a platform to launch from and the close infighting between Armenia, Iceland and Romania kept them in touch when they stumbled. Liechtenstein even tripped up Armenia. It all ended very tightly, but North Macedonia grabbed the play-off spot they were after. Drawn in probably the most brutal path, they sank Italy’s hopes 1-0 before Portugal shattered their dreams with a 2-0 win.
Adam's National Shirt Collection 