North Macedonia claim record win against Algeria

North Macedonia, who became the only European team to proceed to the President’s Cup, started the consolation tournament with their biggest-ever victory at the World Championship. The team coached by the legendary Kiril Lazarov proved too strong for Algeria, winning by 15 goals. 

President’s Cup Group II

Algeria vs North Macedonia 25:40 (11:19)

Both teams had lost all their matches at the group stage and hoped to redeem themselves in their opening encounter of the President’s Cup. However, North Macedonia were regarded as the favourites and confirmed that status by taking a confident win. 

It was quite a one-sided match in which the outcome was clear long before the final whistle. The Europeans were superior throughout the match and claimed two points, both long-awaited and well-deserved. 

In the previous round, North Macedonia had failed to score more than 27 goals in a single match, but now their attack was much more productive as they hit the 40-goal mark for the first time at the World Championship. 

Left wing Dejan Manaskov and line player Žarko Peševski led by example, scoring seven goals each, but goalkeeper Nikola Mitrevski was elected "hummel Player of the Match" for his 10 saves and a 36% save efficiency. 

The rivals were tied at 2:2 six minutes into the match before North Macedonia started to show their firepower, and a 4:0 run, propelled by Manaskov, helped them to open a 6:2 lead.

After that, the Europeans did not slow down and steadily increased their lead as the match progressed. Lazarov’s team had a solid eight-goal advantage at half-time, which allowed them not to worry about the outcome.

In the second half, North Macedonia kept pushing, and their lead reached 16 goals in the closing minutes several times. In the end, the Europeans won by a slightly smaller margin - and interestingly, their previous biggest victory at the World Championship was also against Algeria, 32:19 at Croatia 2009. 

hummel Player of the Match: Nikola Mitrevski (North Macedonia)