PRISTINA, March 30 (Reuters) - Under Serbian rule in the 1990s, sportingevents in Kosovo were banned and soccer games were held privately. After matches, players washed off in small rivers or with melted snow.
Today, Kosovo are on the verge of winning a spot in the World Cup finals for the first time - a potentially momentous sporting turnaround for Europe's youngest nation.
Kosovo, which gained independence from Serbia in 2008 and was only sanctioned to join world soccer in 2016, will host Turkey in a final playoff game on Tuesday following a thrilling 4-3 win over Slovakia last week. The winner will fly to North America for the tournament which starts in June.
"Kosovo's appearance in America would be historic, truly epochal," said Eroll Salihu, former secretary general of Kosovo's federation. "This would be the realisation of a dream, for the generations who played in muddy fields and meadows to defend the honour and spirit of the sport," he said.
Vedat Muriqi is Kosovo's all-time top scorer, but is only interested in qualification and not his goal tally when they face Turkey.
"I don't care at all, I hope that tomorrow I don't score, but we just win," Muriqi told reporters on Monday.
"Not only for me, but for the entire country, after independence it could be the greatest happiness of our country. Tomorrow I strongly believe in victory."
Kosovo, with a population of 1.6 million people, lost nine out of ten games in their first qualifying campaign for the 2018 World Cup.
But positive results emerged when the federation started recruiting from the diaspora. In this latest campaign, the team beat Sweden and Slovenia to earn a place in the qualifying playoffs.
"When I took charge of Kosovo, the goal was to qualify for the European Championship," manager Franco Foda said at Monday's press conference.
"But recent developments have brought us to the brink of the World Cup."
Every match in Kosovo is seen as an achievement for a country scarred by conflict - Kosovo's fight for independence, which was secured by a NATO military air campaign in 1999, left more than 13,000 people dead.
"People have suffered here, each of us has lost many family members," said Samir Ujkani, Kosovo's first captain and goalkeeper who moved to Belgium as a child. "It is our duty to come back here and represent our country," he said.
Meanwhile, excitement is building in Kosovo, whose national stadium holds just 12,500 people - a fifth of the size of many of the World Cup's host venues.
Tickets for Tuesday's game sold out within minutes and are now being resold on the black market for up to 20 times more. Towns will put up big screens in main squares for those who cannot attend the game.
If that is not incentive enough for the players, Kosovo's government promised a bonus of one million euros ($1.15 million) if they win.
($1 = 0.8702 euros)
(Reporting by Fatos Bytyci; additional reporting by Trevor Stynes; editing by Edward McAllister and Christian Radnedge)
