Maccabi Tel Aviv and Cristian Battocchio reached an agreement for the contract termination of the midfielder by mutual consent.

The 26 year-old Argentine-born midfielder, who joined Maccabi in the summer of 2017 as a free transfer and has made 40 appearances in all competitions – mutually agreed with the club to terminate his contract. Battocchio, scored a goal in the 3-1 league victory over Maccabi Haifa on January 15^th last season, one of 24 League appearances he made for Maccabi Tel Aviv. The former Italy U21 international, who wore Maccabi’s Yellow and Blue shirt 11 times in Europe and appeared in all six EUROPA League group stage matches last season, recently recovered from an injury he suffered in April 2018.

Battocchio told the club’s official website: “The club and myself have reached a mutual agreement today. I would like to express my appreciation for the trust of my fellow teammates, the club and the fans put in me. Unfortunately, things didn’t work out the way we had all hoped for. Even though my time at Maccabi was shorter than expected, I fell in love with Tel Aviv and the club and wish the club and fans all the best.”

Maccabi’s CEO, Ben Mansford, added: “Cristian has been a pleasure to have as part of the Maccabi family. Cristian was very much part of our Europa League campaign last year with his performance during the game against Altach in particular. No one will forget the way the team celebrated with him when he scored at Sammy Ofer. Unfortunately Cristian suffered a horrible injury towards the end of last season and this thwarted his progression with us. Cristian is now back towards full fitness and further to discussions with Cristian, we all felt it was best to let Cristian move on now to secure a longer term future elsewhere. I wish Cristian all the very best for the future and he will always be welcome back at Maccabi. Good luck Cristian”.

Maccabi Tel Aviv visits Hapoel Tel Aviv on Monday January 14th at 21:00 on Matchday 18 of the Israel Premier League Ligat Japanika at the Toto-Turner Stadium. Tickets are on sale as per the Away Match Points System and the highest points earners (40 points or more) will be given the right to purchase a ticket to the contest.

A fan that has earned the right to purchase a ticket will receive an SMS with a link to complete the transaction for one ticket until Sunday January 13th at 12:00. A fan that doesn’t purchase the ticket by them will lose the right to purchase the ticket. Tickets may be purchased via the Leaan Website and beginning Thursday 10.1 at 9:00 via the Leaan Ticket Office located at 42 Frishman Street, Tel Aviv and by telephone *8780.

When making the purchase via the website, telephone or Leaan Ticket Office you must have your Season Ticket number/ID number for those who don’t have a season ticket. Please confirm your phone number and email at the time of purchase.

Please note:
Points will not be earned for this match
Print at home only for this match when a ticket is purchased via the website or telephone

Ticket Prices
Maccabi fans will be seated in Sections 1-2
Leaan Ticket Office
Adult – 99 NIS
Child/Soldier/Woman – 49.5 NIS

Telephone/Website
Adult – 104 NIS
Child/Soldier/Woman – 54.5 NIS

Ticket Collection
Tickets may be collected at the Leaan Ticket Office located at 42 Frishman Street between Sunday-Thursday 09:00-19:00, Friday 09:00-12:00.

Maccabi Tel Aviv FC and Hapoel Haifa agreed on the loan deal of 22-year-old winger Matan Hozez till the end of the season.

Hozez, who made four appearances for Maccabi this season in all competitions and spent last season on loan with Bnei Yehuda, will join Hapoel Haifa for a six-month-loan spell.

Maccabi CEO Ben Mansford, told the clubs’ official website: “Matan has been an important part of the culture that we have built at Maccabi this season. Matan has epitomised what Maccabism is. Matan fought every day to push himself and his team mates to the position we currently are in. Unfortunately, Matan has not played as much as he would like and reluctantly we have agreed for him to join Hapoel Haifa in the short term. Everyone at Maccabi believes Matan’s long term future is in Yellow and we are already looking forward to welcoming him back at the end of the season.”

Maccabi Tel Aviv’s 4:1 win over Maccabi Netanya ended another successful evening for Vladimir Ivic’s squad and maintained a 16-point lead on 2nd place on the Israel Premier League Ligat Japanika table. The Yellow & Blue’s recent results have produced some interesting stats and facts:

Setting High Standards
Since the 0:0 Derby on October 1, 2018 Maccabi has recorded five straight home victories with a goal differential of 18:1. 4 against Hapoel Hadera, 3 versus Bnei Sakhnin, 5 against Ashdod, 3 versus Hapoel Beer Sheva, 4 against Maccabi Netanya.

After 17 Matchdays, Maccabi has scored 43 goals the most since 1993/94 when they scored 46. In addition, Maccabi has now scored the most goals after 17 Matchdays since 2000 and passed Hapoel Beer Sheva’s 41 goals from two seasons ago.

Maccabi has now won 7 matches in a row across all competitions and are still undefeated in league play.

In the 17 league matches that have been played to date, Maccabi has scored 2 or more goals in 14 of them.

The goal that will upset Rajkovic
The 86’ goal by Nico Olsak was only the second goal that Maccabi has conceded at home. In fact, the goal was the first by an opposing player to beat Predrag Rajkovic in a home match as the other goal was an own goal by Sheran Yeini for Hapoal Raanana.

The Netanya goal halted an amazing streak of 546 minutes played at home without giving up a goal.

Atzili Double Trouble
It looks like Omer Atzili likes to score braces or not score at all. His brace against Netanya was his third this season in league action and the first time he’s scored since the brace versus away at Kiryat Shemona. Atzili now has 7 league goals and has drawn even with Eliran Atar to lead the team in goal scoring.

Dor Micha scored his first league goal of the campaign and Dan Glezer recorded his first assist in league play and second overall.

Eli Dasa who entered the match in the 35’ assisted on Avi Rikan’s goal and now has 5 assists on the season. Only Micha with 6 has more.

Rikan has a reason to dance
The beautiful goal by Avi Rikan was his 4th league marker of the season and continues to close in on his total of 6 from last season.

Also interesting to note is that Rikan’s last two goals came as a substitute. Against Hapoel Beer Sheva his goal came 7 minutes after entering the contest and yesterday he improved on that mark scoring 4 minutes after coming in. Super-Sub.

Dan Glezer, the Maccabi Tel Aviv midfielder looked back at his side’s 4:1 win over Maccabi Netanya while also talking about the excitement of playing his former club:

“I always have a bit of excitement before a match against Maccabi Netanya because I had played there for a season and I really enjoyed it. I had a good season there and they gave me the chance to shine, so I’ll always be thankful for that. They gave us a tough time, but I’m happy we took the three points. We played well and scored some goals and I hope that this will continue.”

Scoring goals and keeping and trying to not concede:
“Even during the minutes when we didn’t play that well we knew how to not give up a goal and score when we were playing better. I’m happy that we scored the third goal in the second half and it’s too bad that we gave up a goal near the end of the contest because we wanted to keep a clean sheet but all in all I’m happy that we came away with the 3 points.”

Giving our all:
“The coach and professional staff prepare us for every game like it’s the State Cup Final and we can’t let up in our training sessions which are at a very high pace. The coach is always demanding that we give more and that includes the competition we have amongst the players for a place on the squad and that when we do play we give 100%. That makes us all want to play the best that we can and give it our all.”

Playing quality football and the desire to win every match:
“I’m happy that we continue to win and that we have a good gap between us and second place. But our goal is to go into every match and play quality football, win and continue to improve match by match. The coach never lets us take our foot off of the gas and we have a very hungry dressing room with a lot of younger players which is great this season.”

We are Maccabi Tel Aviv:
“We want to win every match. We are Maccabi Tel Aviv. We have players who have grown up through the youth system and they are hungry. We want to return the titles back to the club and give the best we can every single match.”

Vladimir Ivic, the Maccabi Tel Aviv Head Coach looked back at his squad’s 4:1 victory over Maccabi Netanya:

“I wasn’t satisfied with the play after the first 45 minutes but I was satisfied with a 2:0 lead. In the second half we played better and created more chances, That is what we wanted to do at the start, to try and end the game as soon as possible. We have to analyze a lot of things from the first half.”

Season to date:
“We are on a good path. I believe we still have 19 games left and we need to concentrate right until the end of the championship and create a larger gap between us and our opponents. Now we have a week to prepare for the next game.”

The possibility of going undefeated:
“We don’t know. We will do our best to finish the season without a loss.”

Maccabi Tel Aviv defeated Maccabi Netanya 4:1 at the Netanya Stadium on Matchday 17 of the Israel Premier League Ligat Japanika. Omer Atzli scored the fastest goal of the season after just 28 seconds of action, while Dor Micha doubled the lead in first half injury time for a 2:0 advantage. Atzili picked up his second goal of the contest in the 61’ thanks to a tremendous Dan Glezer through ball while Avi Rikan scored a volley “Goal of the Season” candidate in the 82’ thanks to a marvelous Eli Dasa assist. Nico Olsak scored a free kick in the 86’ as the Yellow & Blue wrapped up the victory.

Head Coach Vladimir Ivic’s Starting XI included keeper Predrag Rajkovic, Maor Kandil, Sheran Yeini, Shahar Piven, Enric Saborit, Dor Peretz, Dan Glezer, Dor Micha, Eliran Atar, Omer Atzili, Itay Shechter.

Available on the bench: Haviv Ohayon, Jair Amador, Ruslan Barsky, Eli Dasa, Avi Rikan, Yonatan Cohen, Chico Ofoedu.

First Half
Atzili gave the Yellow & Blue a dream start with a goal after just 28 seconds as the winger buried a brilliant back heal from Atar to give Maccabi a 1:0 lead in what was the quickest goal this season. Ivic’s side almost doubled the lead in the 5’ but Shechter’s header off a Micha cross went over the bar and two minutes later Netanya keeper Golan Elkaslasy blocked a Peretz attempt.

Rajkovic made a huge save in the 18’ when he kicked away Guy Melamed’s chance from in close to keep the score as is, while Kandil was issued a yellow card 3 minutes later. Saborit crossed the ball to Kandil but his header went over the bar in the 27’ while at the other end of the pitch Eylon Yerushalmi’s 17 meter attempt missed the target.

Eli Dasa was introduced for Saborit who couldn’t continue due to injury in the 35’ as Atzili was issued a yellow card two minutes later and in the 39’ Shechter and Branko Vrgoč each were handed yellows for rough play. In the 43’ Atar’s opportunity missed the goal as did Fatos Bećiraj’s chance but inside of first half injury time, Micha took the ball away from Dudi Twito at the top of the box and put it behind the keeper for a 2:0 lead at the break.

Second Half
After 15 minutes of quiet football, Glezer sent Atzili a massive 50 meter through ball that he put into the goal for a 3:0 Maccabi lead in the 61’. Gavriel Kanichowsky had a chance to cut the Maccabi advantage in the 63’ but Rajko was up to the task and 3 minutes later the Serbian shot stopper again stymied Kanichowsky.

In the 67’ Chico Ofoedu came on for Shechter and sent a terrific ball to Peretz in the 74’ but his attempt missed the target. Avi Rikan was then inserted in the 78’ in favor Atar and the move paid dividends 4 minutes later when Rikan scored a volley “Goal of the Season” candidate off a brilliant assist by Dasa from the right side to give the Yellow & Blue a 4:0 lead.

Nico Olsak pulled a goal back for Netanya via a free kick in the 86’ but it was too little, too late as Maccabi Tel Aviv took the 4:1 win and the 3 points.