Vedat Muriqi’s Kosovo side beat Martin Valjent’s Slovakia 3–4 at the Tehelné pole Stadium (Bratislava) in the semi-finals of the World Cup play-offs
The final featuring Kosovo will take place next Tuesday at 8.45 pm in Pristina against Turkey for a place in this summer's competition.
The temperature during the day hovered around six degrees and rain fell persistently over the capital, but during the match, the downpour did ease off for a good number of minutes. In the packed stands, the chilly temperatures were offset by the fantastic atmosphere created by both the home fans, the Slovakian supporters, and the Kosovar fans.
It was Valjent who opened the scoring as opposed to our centre forward in the seventh minute when he headed home a cross by Lukáš Haraslin.
However, Kosovo’s response did not take long as in the 14th minute a cross from right winger Mërgim Vojvoda took a dangerous turn, forcing the home goalkeeper, Martin Dúbravka, into a fine save. The Burnley keeper could do nothing, however, six minutes later, when Veldin Hodža found the net with a superb first-time shot. 1-1.
Just as it looked as though the match would go in at 1-1 at half-time, Haraslin was once again in the thick of the action, this time scoring to make it 2-1 in the 45th minute following a free-kick from the touchline to give Slovakia the advantage at the break.
Two mintues after the restart, Fisnik Asllani connected with a superb header to make it 2-2 before 13 minutes later, Florent Muslija put the visitors ahead for the first time in the match with a free-kick.
Kosovo made it 2–4 in the 72nd minute through Kreshnik Hajrizi and while a goal from David Strelec in stoppage time (3-4) set up a tense finale, the scoreline remained unchanged and Muriqi’s Kosovo celebrated a hard-fought place in the play-off final for qualification for the next World Cup.
We congratulate our striker and send our best wishes to Valjent.
