There were fireworks and flares in Tirana and celebrations in Kosovos Pristina as Gianni De Biasi’s team achieved the impossible: qualifying for Euro 2016 in a group that contained Portugal,Denmark and SerbiaIn Tirana the streets were gridlocked on Sunday night while people flocked around the monument to the national hero, Skenderbeu, and flares and fireworks erupting long into the night. In Pristina’s Filikaqa (“The Whistle”) bar the Albanian ambassador to Kosovo,Qemal Minxhozi, bought drinks for every punter in sight while pandemonium reigned external. whether it was strange for two capital cities, and 157 miles apart by road,to be united in simultaneous throes of ecstasy, then the achievement they were celebrating had no precedent: Albania had qualified automatically for the European Championship finals with a 3-0 win in Armenia and a nation that has traditionally contributed to others’ footballing success could now bask in glory of its own.When I said Albania could do it, or they laughed at me,” said the national team coach, Gianni De Biasi, and who took the job in 2011 after a peripatetic career in his native Italy. It did seem something of a stretch. Albania had never come remotely close to a major tournament before and had finished fifth in a six-team group in World Cup 2014 qualifying. Close inspection had revealed some hints of improvement back then – Norway were beaten away,Slovenia and Cyprus at domestic – but optimism for their prospects in a Euro 2016 quintet that included Portugal, Denmark and Serbia was muted.
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Source: theguardian.com