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2014 Kosovo v Haiti football match

International Friendly
Date 5 March 2014 (2014-03-05)
Venue Olympic Stadium Adem Jashari, Mitrovica
Referee Stephan Klossner (Switzerland)
Attendance 17,000

Kosovo vs Haiti was the first international match involving the Kosovar national football team to be recognised by FIFA, and the first to take place within Kosovo. The match was an international friendly between representative teams from Kosovo and Haiti.

FIFA were lobbied by several prominent Kosovar football personalities including Albania captain Lorik Cana to allow the national team to play against FIFA member associations. Initially, FIFA only allowed Kosovo to play games against FIFA member associations at youth and amateur level, as well as ladies football. In January 2014, later allowed Kosovo to play games against FIFA member associations at full international. Kosovo organised a friendly against Haiti for April 2014.

At the time of the game, Haiti were ranked 79th by FIFA in the FIFA Ranking System. Kosovo were not ranked as they were not a member association of FIFA.

Kosovo's President Atifete Jahjaga and Prime Minister Hashim Thaci were both in attendance.

The game was also Frenchman Marc Collat's first in charge of the Haiti national team.

Several players who had played for other countries had chosen to represent the Kosovo national team. Albanian international goalkeeper Samir Ujkani chose to accept a call-up, as did Finland international Lum Rexhepi, Norway international Ardian Gashi and Switzerland international Albert Bunjaku.


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