After winning their two previous State Cup matches, the Under-19 team was drawn against Hapoel Haifa in the Israel State Cup Quarterfinals in a contest held at Kiryat Haim, home of the Northern Reds. The Yellow-and-Blue looked to avenge two defeats to Haifa and continue on in the competition.
Following a 4:1 victory at Wassermil Stadium against Hapoel Beer Sheva, Head Coach Ziv Arie made only one change to his starting XI with Noam Cohen replacing Amit Rosenboim who was off on Army duty.
The match opened up in very cautious fashion by both sides as Oliel Peretz picked up a yellow card early on. Following a number of quality corner kicks by the young Yellow-and-Blue, Haifa was off to the races as Derrick Bonnah made his way towards the Maccabi “Shachar” goal and keeper Hen Ozeri, beating the shot stopper to give the home side a 1:0 lead.
The Under-19 team didn’t let the deficit get them down and applied pressure to find the equalizer, but Peretz’s chance went right to the Red’s keeper as they took their slim advantage into the break.
Head Coach Arie made one substitution to begin the second half as Tomer Altman was introduced in place of Noam Cohen as Maccabi moved to a formation sporting three central defenders. Unfortunately, the second half began just as the first did with the Yellow-and-Blue giving up another goal to go down by two. Maxim Falchenko’s free kick from 20 meters again beat Ozeri as the Reds increased their lead to 2:0.
Arie brought on Omri Haramati who had a number of chances but couldn’t find the back of the goal while a Gaby Kanichowsky short range effort was stopped cold by the Haifa keeper. To add insult to injury, five minutes from time, a counter attack by the Reds led to their third and final goal of the match when Ener Shecter beat Ozeri to finish the match off 3:0 and bounce Maccabi “Shachar” from the tourney.
