So far Maccabi and Beitar Jerusalem played each other 130 league matches. Maccabi won 53 matches, Beitar won 38 while 39 matches were drawn with the goal tally 183-134 in Maccabi’s favour.

Beitar hosted Maccabi 67 times in the league with Maccabi winning 22, Beitar winning 25 and 20 matches were drawn. The goal tally in these matches is currently on 70-68 in favour of Maccabi.

Beitar failed to score on the previous four encounters against Maccabi at Teddy stadium (Maccabi won 2 and drawn 2). This has equaled a record Beitar has against Maccabi between 1976-1980 and Hapoel Petah Tikva between 2001-2003.

Maccabi’s unbeaten run against Beitar in the league now stretches to 9 matches (6 wins and 3 draws).

This is the second longest run against Beitar with the previous run of 11 unbeaten matches was achieved in September 1984.

Maccabi’s biggest league victory away to Beitar Jerusalem was a 4-0 win recorded in the 2019/20 season.

Since 2018 all of the 3 penalties awarded to Beitar against Maccabi were saved. Predrag Rajkovic saved 2 and 1 penalty was saved by Daniel Tenenbaum.

This is record of successive penalties saved against the same opponent.

No less than 65 players featured for both clubs – 6 of whom only played for Beitar and Maccabi in the Israeli top flight: Danny Noiman, Joze Romalho, Avi Nimni, Barak Itzhaki, Eli Dasa and Tal Ben Haim.

Avi Nimni is Maccabi’s made the most appearances against Beitar Jerusalem with featuring in 30 matches. Of the current squad, Sheran Yeini played 25 league matches against Beitar is ranked in fourth place.

Nimni, is also the record goal-scorer against Beitar with 15 goals to his name.

Sunday December 5th: Beitar Jerusalem vs Maccabi Tel Aviv (Teddy stadium at 20:45).

Following Wednesday’s 1-1 draw against Nof Hagalil at Bloomfield stadium, Maccabi will try and return to winning ways as they travel to Jerusalem for a match against Beitar. The Jerusalem club is currently in turmoil which saw their Dutch coach Erwin Koeman step-down following the defeat to Bnei Sachnin.    

Thursday December 9^th : Alashkert vs Maccabi Tel Aviv (Republican stadium at 19:45).

Maccabi travel to Yerevan for the final Match Day of the Conference League group stage as they face the Armenian side currently ranked bottom of the table. The 1-0 home defeat to LASK meant that Maccabi missed out on automatic qualification to the Round of 16, but regardless of the result at the Armenian capital, already qualified to the Round of 32. A victory against the side beaten 4-1 in the corresponding match will earn Maccabi bonus money as well as precious coefficient points.

Monday December 13^th : Conference League knockout round Playoff draw (Nyon, 15:00)

Sixteen teams go into the Round of 32 knock-out playoff draw at UEFA’s Headquarters in Nyon, Switzerland. Maccabi will be one of 8 seeded clubs that finished the Europa Conference League group stage in the runners up-spots, as they will be drawn with 8 third-placed teams from the UEFA Europa League group stage (unseeded teams).  Ties take place over two legs (February 17^th and 24^th) with seeded teams hosting the return legs. The winners of the 8 ties will join the eight Conference League group winners in the round of 16.

Monday December 13^th : Maccabi Tel Aviv vs Hapoel Hadera (Bloomfield stadium at 20:15).

After discovering their Conference League opponents earlier that day, Maccabi return to league action and host Hapoel Hadera on MD13 for a match that will conclude the first league round.

Sunday December 19^th : Maccabi Tel Aviv vs Hapoel Marmorek (Bloomfield, 20:00)

Reigning State Cup holders, Maccabi begin their defence of the title with a home tie against third division side Hapoel Marmorek at Bloomfield stadium.

Wednesday December 22^nd : Maccabi Tel Aviv vs Bnei Sachnin (Bloomfield stadium at 20:00)

Maccabi kick-starts the league campaign with a match that will open the second league round (MD14) against the side that inflicted them a 3-1 defeat on the season’s curtain raiser.

Monday December 27^th : Maccabi Petah Tikva vs Maccabi Tel Aviv (Petah Tikva at 20:30).

Maccabi’s final fixture for 2021 will see them face the Petah Tikva side in a bid to get a better result that then 1-1 draw when both sides previously met earlier this season.

Preview

Maccabi arrived at Bloomfield stadium for the match against newly promoted side Hapoel Nof Hagalil on the back of Sunday’s 3-1 victory over Hapoel Haifa that saw them climb up the table. With 14 points from the opening 10 matches, Barak Itzhaki and his charges knew that a second victory in succession will take them further up the table. Itzhaki made a single change from the side that won at Haifa as Osama Khalaila led Maccabi’s attack replacing Croatian striker Stipe Perica who waited for his chance on the bench.

The defence remained unchanged with Luis Hernandez and Idan Nachmias as the two central defenders right in front of goalkeeper Daniel Peretz. Enric Saborit and Andre Geraldes completed the back-four on the left and right respectively while Sheran Yeini kept his role as the anchor-man in midfield. Eyal Golasa and Gabi Kanichowsky were the two additional midfielders assigned to supply the ammunition for the frontline. Tal Ben Chaim who opened his account against Haifa kept his place in the side with Brandley Kuwas at the opposite side with a clear task of supporting Khalaila.
Prior to kickoff Maccabi held a ceremony in memory of Bloomfield’s stadium manager, Eitan Shor, who lost his battle against cancer this week and dies at the age of 55.

First Half

Maccabi began the match pressing Nof Hagalil into their own half which almost resulted in an early goal. Osama Khalaila stripped a Nof Hagalil defender of the ball deep inside the visitors’ half before shrugging off another on the way into the box. But the young industrious striker who was in a good position to shoot, had his effort blocked by a defender.

A minute later, Luis Hernandez became the first player to be booked by referee Erez Papir for pulling a Nof Hagalil opponent near the halfway line. Maccabi continued to look dangerous as Tal Ben Chaim had a shot blocked for a corner in the 10th minute while Enric Saborit sent a cross that didn’t find a Maccabi player in the box on 13. Eyal Golasa had a left foot shot deflected for a corner in the 20th minute which resulted with a Saborit shot that was blocked once again.

Right on the half hour mark, Sheran Yeini was also booked for a foul which stopped a Nof Hagalil counter attack. Roei Shukrani tested Daniel Peretz with a right foot shot from the edge of the area in the 35^th minute that was equalled by the young Maccabi keeper.

Brandley Kuwas who sent an earlier effort over the bar, had another powerful shot which narrowly missed the target on 36 as it seemed the Curaçao forward is getting closer to find the target. Three minutes later and against the run of play, Nof Hagalil managed to level the score as Waheb Habiballah successfully converted the ball past Peretz after Maccabi struggled to clear a corner.

With no further goals the referee’s halftime whistle sent both teams to the dressing room for 15 minutes of a break.

Second Half

Nof Hagalil were forced to make a change at the restart as their goal scorer, Habiballah, who picked an injury before the interval was replaced by Stav Nachmani.

A Kuwas left foot half volley in the 49th minute went wide of the target before Ben Chaim who was put through by Khalaila sent his shot straight at Marinovic on 50. Itzhaki made his first change in the 58th minute as Stipe Perica came in for Khalaila.

An Eyal Golasa shot in the 64th minute, cleared the crossbar which was his final contribution on the night. Shortly after, Itzhaki made a double change with Golasa replaced by Eden Shamir while Dan Biton came in for Ben Chaim.

In the 69^th minute, a well drilled free kick fell to Saborit only for the Spanish defender’s effort blocked by a defender before Marinovic collected with ease. Yeini had a good chance to restore Maccabi’s lead in the 73rd minute as he chested a Kuwas corner at the far post. But the veteran captain saw his volley saved by the keeper before Perica fired the rebound wide.

Eylon Almog and Eduardo Guerrero came in for Kuwas and Kanichowsky on 85 as the Itzhaki sent in two players with fresh legs for the final 5 minutes.

Despite four minutes of added time, Maccabi couldn’t breach the visitors’ defence who celebrated the draw at the final whistle amid the displeasure expressed by the majority of 10,240 fans who attended the match.

“we were not good enough. In situations like this in football there is no room to hide or make excuses. The fact you claimed that Mitch is maybe less involved or this no coach, is far from being the issue here, because if we would have won then no one would have been speaking about this” Ben Chaim said at the post match press conference. “With all due to respect to tonight’s opponents, and I have a lot of respect from them, I think that we must beat Nof Hagalil in every situation with or without a coach. Each and every one of us needs to go home and take a close look in the mirrorWatch Ben Chaim sums up the 1-1 draw against Nof Hagalil

The veteran forward who spoke after the 1-1 draw against newly promoted side Nof Hagalil: “We need to work even harder in order to reach a stage where we reach the results this club deserves”.

“we were not good enough. In situations like this in football there is no room to hide or make excuses. The fact you claimed that Mitch is maybe less involved or this no coach, is far from being the issue here, because if we would have won then no one would have been speaking about this” Ben Chaim said at the post match press conference. “With all due to respect to tonight’s opponents, and I have a lot of respect from them, I think that we must beat Nof Hagalil in every situation with or without a coach. Each and every one of us must go home and take a close look at himself in the mirror, but also all of us a collective, as a team to see what we are not doing right. Obviously we must keep on working hard in training, even harder, so that we reach a stage where we get the results this club is worthy of”.

Ben Chaim, who scored back-to-back goals against both Hapoel Haifa and Nof Hagalil, didn’t try and hide, as he added: “There are no excuses for how we looked today – from the first to the last player. I think there isn’t one player who looked good today, which means we must draw the conclusions and move on forward so we would all get us out of this situation”.

The Head of Football Department who is acting as an interim coach, faced the media after the 1-1 draw against Nof Hagalil at Bloomfield stadium.
“the second half wasn’t good, not the first one was great but our mistake was that we dragged into playing at their tempo which is a shame” Itzhaki said, “It wasn’t a good game, we didn’t deserve to win this match and if we want to win games we must play at a higher tempo and with a lot more passion. Matches like that are not acceptable especially not by me”.

When asked how he intends to deal with it, Itzhaki replied: “There is one way to tackle this situation and that is by continuing to work hard. It might sound like a cliche or a slogan but if we want to improve and if we want to do something with this season – we must work hard and play much better than the way we played today. We are not experiencing a good spell, from the start of the season we are not getting results or playing the football expected from a club like Maccabi Tel Aviv. I honestly believe that there are good players here and it should click. If we don’t continue to work it will continue to look like it did today”.

When asked whether Maccabi allegedly lost some of its’ spirit, he clarified: “There is a really strong club here. Covering this club for so many years, you know it as much as I do. We didn’t have a good start to the season, and we are not hiding from that. The coaching staff and the players together are those who should work together in order to get us out of this position. If we won’t then it will not happen. This club is very strong, and we must remain united especially at difficult times like this because strong characters rise to the occasion in difficult times. When everything is working well it is easy. I expect first from myself, from the players, and people around the club to support the team because we are measured at tough times. We must remain united”.

As for the decisions he took before and during the game, he replied: “When the game is played like that one can talk about the substitutions. I might have made mistakes, but this is what I saw right in terms of the situation as it it a petty we couldn’t score as I introduced all our attacking tools”.

On the squad he has at his disposal and the building process in assembling this group of players: “I think there is a good group of players here, but the team and it’s qualities doesn’t match our position in the table”.

Maccabi faced Hapoel Nof Hagalil (or in their previous name Hapoel Nazareth Ilit) only 6 times in the league.

Of the 45 league opponents to face Maccabi throughout history, only 7 clubs played Maccabi less times than Nof Hagalil. Ahi Nazaretn (5), Maccabi Rishon Lezion (4), Hapoel Balfuriya (4), Maccabi Kiryat Gat (3), Beitar Netanya (2), Hapoel Taybeh (2) and Hapoel Marmorek (2).

Maccabi met Hapoel Nof Hagalil, under their previous name – Hapoel Nazareth Ilit, when the newly promoted side played in the top flight during the 2004/05 and 2005/06 seasons. Maccabi won only 1 of those six encounters while the remaining 5 (83%) ended in a draw.

Nof Hagalil’s current coach Yaron Hochenboim met Maccabi 5 times in the league whilst in charge of Hapoel Acco and Hapoel Ramat Gan with Maccabi winning 4 and drawing once.

Maccabi played 308 times against newly promoted sides, including this season’s 1-0 victory over Hapoel Jerusalem. The record of these matches is clearly in Maccabi’s favour winning 182, drawing 79 and losing 46.

Maccabi’s record in the first meeting against newly promoted sides (136 matches) is: 75 victories, 41 draws and 20 defeats.

The highest ever victory over a newly promoted side was a 7-0 victory over Beitar Tel Aviv in the 1969/70 season. Shalom Shikva (4), Giyora Spiegel, Nissim Bachar and Dror Bar Nur scored the goals.