Northern Ireland v Slovakia

DOMESTIC

The Slovak Super Liga was launched in 1993 following the dissolution of Czechoslovakia, and Slovan Bratislava are the competition’s most successful club with 10 titles to their credit. The league has fluctuated in size across the years, going from 12 clubs to 16 to 10 before returning to its current format of a dozen teams. Slovan have won the past two titles but Dunajska Streda – who have yet to win a top flight league championship – have made a strong start to the 2020-21 campaign and were leading the way at the start of November. Slovan’s current manager is Darko Milanic, the Slovenian who was in charge of Leeds United for just 32 days back in 2014. He failed to win any of his six games at the helm of the Yorkshire club. Both Glentoran and Linfield played against Slovakian clubs in the qualifying rounds for the 2015-16 Europa League. Zilina eliminated Glentoran with a 7-1 aggregate success in the first qualifying round, while Spartak Trnava knocked Linfield out in the second qualifying round with a 5-2 aggregate victory. The only club from either Slovakia or the former Czechoslovakia to lift a major European trophy are Slovan, who won the 1968-69 Cup Winners’ Cup when they defeated Barcelona 3-2 in the final. Szilard Nemeth, a striker who played over 100 times for Middlesbrough, is among the top five all-time leading scorers in the Super Liga, while Manchester United midfielder Nemanja Matic played for MFK Kosice prior to first joining Chelsea in 2009.

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