Eternal derby (North Macedonia)

Eternal derby (Вечно дерби), also known as the Macedonia derby (Македонско дерби), is the name given to matches between the two most popular clubs from North Macedonia, the Skopje-based FK Vardar and Bitola-based FK Pelister, supported by Komiti and Čkembari respectively, with fans at times infamously engaging in hooliganism during the derby. The rivalry can be traced back to the 1989–90 season and a match in Skopje, between FK Vardar and Red Star Belgrade. A conflict occurred between the "Skopje fans" and a few Bitola fans who went to cheer for Vardar, who at that time was the most popular Macedonian football club in the former Yugoslavia. On 5 August 1990 in Bitola, Pelister and Vardar met in the Yugoslav second league and the first incident occurred. From that day forward, started the big rivalry between Komiti and Chkembari along with the Vardar-Pelister match becoming the Eternal derby of Macedonia.

However, the rivalry is playing at the stands but not much at the ground because Vardar there are many more honours than a rival from Bitola. In a present time there is a small number of attendance and Pelister were many times and Vardar once relegated to the Macedonian Second League so the rivalry has lost its formerly importance. , there have been 68 derbies played in total since the establishment of the Macedonian championship in 1992, with Vardar winning 38 and Pelister 14 games, while 16 matches ended in a draw.

Statistics
The records does not include the awarded matches and a matches decided by a one goal difference.

Head-to-head
Last updated on 9 May 2023.

Records
(Karadzhov, Markovski, Nikolovski, Trajchev, Serafimovski, Stojkoski, Stanić) (Vasoski, Bozhinovski ) (Manevski (2) ) (Peev – Miranda (3) )
 * Record League win
 * Vardar
 * Home: Vardar – Pelister 7–0, Gradski stadion, 8 May 1996
 * Away: Pelister – Vardar 0–2, Stadion Tumbe Kafe, 13 April 2003
 * Pelister
 * Home: Pelister – Vardar 2–0, Stadion Tumbe Kafe, 4 April 2021
 * Away: Vardar – Pelister 1–3, Gradski stadion, 26 April 2008

(Dashyan, Velkovski, Hambardzumyan, Grncharov – Nedanoski) and Vardar – Pelister 3–0, Gradski stadion, 17 April 1996 (Shakiri, Serafimovski, Petreski) (Trajkovski o.g., Stojkov)
 * Record Cup win
 * Vardar
 * Home: Vardar – Pelister 4–1, Philip II Arena, 30 September 2015
 * Away: Pelister – Vardar 0–2, Stadion Goce Delchev, 21 October 2015


 * Longest sequence of League wins
 * Vardar: 7, 17 August 2002 – 11 October 2007
 * Home: 4, 23 August 2008 – 30 September 2012
 * Away: 6, 1 April 2001 – 29 April 2007
 * Pelister: 2, 16 March 2008 – 26 April 2008
 * Home: 3, 29 October 1995 – 14 March 1998
 * Away: 1


 * Longest sequence of Cup wins
 * Vardar: 4, 7 November 2012 – 21 October 2015
 * Home: 4, 11 April 2007–present
 * Away: 2, 7 November 2012 – 21 October 2015
 * Pelister: 3, 15 March 2000 – 25 February 2001
 * Home: 2, 15 March 2000 – 25 February 2001
 * Away: 1


 * Longest sequence of unbeaten League matches
 * Vardar: 15, 3 October 1998 – 11 October 2007
 * Home: 15, 24 February 1991 – 11 October 2007
 * Away: 8, 3 October 1998 – 29 April 2007 and 6 March 2013 – 4 October 2020
 * Pelister: 7, 1 April 2018–present
 * Home: 5, 7 November 1993 – 14 March 1998 and 16 March 2008 – 28 March 2010
 * Away: 3, 13 April 2013 – 23 April 2014 and 13 May 2018–present


 * Longest sequence of unbeaten Cup matches
 * Vardar: 7, 4 April 2001–present
 * Home: 4, 4 April 2001–present
 * Away: 3, 2 May 2007–present
 * Pelister: 4, 1 May 1996 – 25 February 2001
 * Home: 4, 1 May 1996 – 2 May 2007
 * Away: 1


 * Bigger grade difference
 * Vardar
 * Point system 3–1–0: +44 (72 vs 28), 2002–03
 * Pelister
 * Point system 3–1–0: +18 (47 vs 29), 1999–2000

Key

 * Colors


 * Competitions
 * SF = Semi-finals
 * QF = Quarter-finals
 * R16 = Round of 16

Results
1 Vardar won 4–2 on penalties and won the one point.

2 Match suspended after 45 minutes (score: 0–0) due to the crowd trouble. Vardar were awarded a 0–3 win.

3 Match suspended before the kick-off due to the crowd trouble when Čkembari burned seats, collapsed the protective fence and clashed with the police. Vardar were awarded a 0–3 win.

4 The 2000–01 Macedonian Cup quarter-final tie was won by Pelister on away goals rule.

5 Pelister was played in the Second League in that season.

6 Vardar was played in the Second League in that season.

7 Pelister won 3–2 on penalties.

Players who have played for both clubs (senior career)

 * Goce Aleksovski
 * Marjan Altiparmakovski
 * Jovica Anđelković
 * Nikola Avramovski
 * Almir Bajramovski
 * Dejan Blazhevski
 * Dragan Bocheski
 * Radenko Bojović
 * Zoran Boshkovski
 * Vladica Brdarovski
 * Antonio Bujchevski
 * Saša Ćirić
 * Matej Cvetanovski
 * Mile Dimov
 * Ilir Elmazovski
 * Simeon Hristov
 * Kire Grozdanov


 * Marko Jovanovski
 * Dragi Kanatlarovski
 * Nikola Karchev
 * Pece Korunovski
 * Vlatko Kostov
 * Blagoja Kuleski
 * Blagoja Ljamchevski
 * Borche Manevski
 * Toni Meglenski
 * Gorazd Mihajlov
 * Petar Miloshevski
 * Sasho Miloshevski
 * Gjorgji Mojsov
 * Zlatko Nastevski
 * Tome Pachovski
 * Igor Pavlović
 * Zoran Paunov


 * Oliver Peev
 * Filip Petrov
 * Mirko Petrov
 * Jovan Popzlatanov
 * Bogoljub Ranđelović
 * Vasko Raspashkovski
 * Zhanko Savov
 * Stefan Spirovski
 * Kire Sterjov
 * Boško Stupić
 * Goce Todorovski
 * Milan Todorovski
 * Kristijan Toshevski
 * Aco Vasilevski
 * Toni Veljanovski
 * Dragan Veselinovski

Players who have scored for both clubs in the derby

 * Dejan Blazhevski (4 goals, 2 for Pelister and 2 for Vardar)
 * Saša Ćirić (2 goals, 1 for Pelister and 1 for Vardar)
 * Mile Dimov (2 goals, 1 for Pelister and 1 for Vardar)

Managers who have worked at both clubs

 * Boban Babunski
 * Ilija Dimoski
 * Kiril Dojchinovski
 * Perica Gruevski
 * Gjoko Hadjievski
 * Alekso Mackov
 * Gorazd Mihajlov

Honours
These are the major football honours of Vardar and Pelister.

Head-to-head league ranking
The table lists the place each team took in each of the seasons.

Key

Source: rsssf.org