Macedonia taunt England
Macedonian midfielder Artim Sakiri, who plays for West Brom, branded England a long-ball team and said they could suffer under the pressure of Saturday's crucial match.
Sakiri said: "England cannot play the ball on the ground, when the game is like that it is a big problem for them.
"And England still have many things wrong with their defence, they're not strong."
Sakiri, who scored direct from a corner in Macedonia's 2-2 draw with England last year, insisted his side had nothing to lose after failing to qualify for Euro 2004.
He said: "England have to win, whereas we will not have any weight on our shoulders."
"My players will do their best and show they are capable of achieving a good result against a great team" claims Macedonia boss Dragan Kanatlarovski
Defender Aleksander Vasoski also chipped in, saying: "All the crowd will be behind us, it is a small stadium and the atmosphere will be white hot.
"The England players will not know what's hit them."
Macedonia coach Dragan Kanatlarovski, at the helm for his second stint after the dismissal of Nikola Ilievski, was left to pick up the pieces of a failed qualifying campaign.
He has recalled Partizan Belgrade defender Milan Stojanoski and kept faith with the four players brought back for the friendly against Albania - defenders Igor Gjuzelov, Igor Mitreski and Goran Stavrevski, and striker Georgi Hristov.
But Kanatlarovski is missing defender Goce Sedloski through suspension, while defender Aleksandar Vasoski and striker Robert Popov are injured.
Kanatlarovski said: "We've nothing to lose against England. My players will do their best and show they are capable of achieving a good result against a great team."
Besides, considering two of their key players are Sakiri (West Brom sub) and Georgi Hristov (Barnsley reject), I don't think we should be too worried about what they have to say. Quite funny to see Sakiri trying to call his corner 'perfect' though, everybody could see he completely screwed up a simple centre and Seaman was too slow to adjust.
This game is all on us. If we play well, we win, if we play badly, we'll deserve to struggle.
http://soccernet.espn.go.com/headlinenews?id=276202&cc=5901
In the midst of all this hot air, the Macedonians are trying to paper over the embarrassment of first deciding to relieve coach Nikola Ilievski of his duties and giving Dragan Kanatlarovski interim control, but then axing Ilievski instantly after an alleged expenses problem.
That has left Kanatlarovski to pick up the pieces of a failed qualifying campaign.
Its quite surreal when everybodys screaming for him to shoot as he approaches the corner flag.
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