Maccabi Haifa will try to take a significant step towards the championship title tonight (Monday, 20:30) when they play a tough away game in Bloomfield against Hapoel Tel Aviv. Assuming that Hapoel Beer Sheva beats Kiryat Shmona, the gap will be temporarily reduced to one point, which will require the Greens to get three points to open a gap of four points again, all this before the start of the upper playoff games.
Coach Barak Becher is looking for continuity for the good ability in the derby. The club does not forget that in the last month the team experienced a shake-up in the results and the system must be stabilized just before the last straight. Along with victories against KS and Beitar Jerusalem, there were also losses to Ashdod in the league and Netanya in the cup.
“We have to come to the game as if we have our backs against the wall. This year there have been quite a few cases each time when our opponents have lost points – we have also lost. We must be bad on the field and create continuity,” said Maccabi Haifa.
Coach Barak Bacher will be forced to make one significant change in the defense, when Dylan Betbinsika is expected to replace the injured Sean Goldberg. Dylan is expected to open next to Abdulai Sak. The latter, like Dolev Haziza and Pierre Cornot, will have to be careful of a yellow card in the game, since in the event of a ticket for one of the three, they will miss the season’s game against Hapoel B.S.
Assuming Tubinsica starts, there will be no escape from giving up one of the foreigners, since only five foreigners can be on the field at the same time, and the loss will probably fall to Franzi Piero. In such a situation, the one who deviates will be Dia Saba. Mahmoud Jaber is expected to return to Kishore, who will play alongside Ali Muhammad.
In the meantime, the CEO of the club, Itzik Ovadia, addressed the fans: “Dear fans, over 11 thousand fans are expected to accompany us to the game tomorrow at Bloomfield against Hapoel Tel Aviv. A record number in recent years for a league game outside of Haifa and we are all proud and grateful for the tremendous support. This is not self-evident for the club.
We would like to thank the management of Hapoel Tel Aviv for responding to our request to increase the allocation and for the desire to fill Bloomfield with the audiences of both teams and creating a wonderful football atmosphere. And for the fans, let’s concentrate on encouraging and supporting the team and our players and take care of the facility that hosts us.”
Approximate lineup: Josh Cohen, Daniel Sondgren, Dylan Betobinsika, Abdoulaye Sek, Pierre Corneau, Ali Muhammad, Mahmoud Jaber, Chiron Sherry, Dolev Haziza, Dia Saba and Omar Azili.