Tal Ben Chaim admitted that Monday’s dramatic defeat to Maccabi Haifa was the toughest of his footballing career, but remained adamant that the team will have to bounce back against the top of the table side. Speaking ahead of Saturday’s visit of Be’ersheva to Bloomfield, Ben Chaim said: “With all the hardships and there were massive hardships here, we need to pick ourselves up. We are facing an extremely tough home match against Be’ersheva who so far had an amazing season” Ben Chaim said. “I believe that once again Be’ersheva are favourites for this game which is a scenario I never believed could happen – that other teams would be favourites against us at Bloomfield. I think this feeling alone should give us the extra motivation we need in order to turn up and win this game”.

With Maccabi ranked fourth with 25, Be’ersheva’s unbeaten run of 16 league matches places them top with 40 points a fact that Ben Chaim acknowledged: “There season so far is nothing short of monstrous, but we will be super prepared, respect our opponents like we do with every opponent and needless to say will do our maximum to win this match”.