Tomer Havez
The players of the Israel Youth National Team (Itzik Blanitsky)
A little more than two weeks are left for the first match in the playoff stage of promotion to the European Championship for young teams, when the situation of Guy Luzon’s staff is extremely worrying and it seems that most of the players who led the team to the current achievement, will not be available to him.
Besides players like Aden Kartsev, Doron Leidner, and Liel Abda, who will play with the senior team against Albania (and may be at the coach’s disposal in the second leg), also Or Belorian (has not trained in a team setting since the summer), Sof Podgorano (injured with Maccabi Haifa) and Omari Gandelman (injured and will only return in October) will not be available to him. In addition, Daniel Peretz, who also plays for the senior team, doubts the young woman’s performance and a decision needs to be made. In any case, Maccabi Tel Aviv’s goalkeeper will surely be available for the second game.
To them can be added Maor Levy, who was a top player in the rotation and does not get minutes at Maccabi Haifa, Mohamed Kanaan who only recently returned to playing form and Karam Jaber, Yuval Sade and Amir Berkovich who get at least minutes of playing time at Maccabi Netanya recently, thus getting a worrying situation of at least seven Players who were dominant and will not be available.
The current situation may cause Luzon to call up younger players than the current year (year 2000-2001) when players from the youth team such as Oskar Gloch, El Yam Kanzpolski and Stav Lemkin may win a call-up to strengthen the squad. As you may remember, Gloch Kabesh played for the youth team under Guy Luzon and even started in the two games he participated in.
Until the departure for Ireland, the team often gathers on Wednesdays, but even these trainings are not held with a full squad and sometimes with the presence of only 10-15 players. On September 19 (Monday) the players will gather and conduct training in Israel, until the departure on Tuesday for Ireland, where they will conduct only two training sessions.
“Those who want to underestimate Ireland and were happy about the draw can underestimate. The last time the teams met, back then with Manor Solomon and Sean Weissman, we lost 4:0 so we need to know our place, certainly in this squad,” said the team.
