2.9: Hapoel Beer Sheva – Maccabi Tel Aviv, 21:00 Toto Turner Stadium
The top two clubs in Israeli football will meet on Matchday 2 of the Israel Premier League, Ligat Japanika. The Yellow & Blue defeated Maccabi Haifa last week in the season opener while Beer Sheva drew 1:1 at Kiryat Shemona. All you need to know about the match can be found right here.

Also on the Website:
In honor of the first day of school: What was it like for the Maccabi players to return to school?

3-14.9: International Break
After two Matchdays, the Israel Premier League will take a short break for National Team matches in the brand new UEFA Nations Cup League as Israel visits Albania on September 7th. There are five Yellow & Blue representatives playing for Israel: Eitan Tibi, Eli Dasa, Dor Micha, Dan Glazer and Dor Peretz. Predrag Rajkovic was called into the Serbian squad and they will play Lithuania and Romania.

15.9: Maccabi Tel Aviv – Hapoel Raanana, Netanya Stadium (Date and time to be confirmed)
The first challenge after the break for Head Coach Vladimir Ivic and his side will be a home contest against the Sharon based team. The final date and time will be confirmed over the next few days.

17.9: Transfer Window Closes
The window closes for most European leagues earlier than Israel and the teams in the Ligat Japanika have an additional two weeks to solidify their squads until the winter transfer window opens. If you want to know the latest news from the club, make sure to download the Official Maccabi Tel Aviv App and ensure that your settings allow you to receive push notifications. To download the App click here.

22.9: Maccabi Netanya – Maccabi Tel Aviv, Netanya Stadium (Date and time to be confirmed)
The beginning of the 2018/19 season sees Maccabi play a number of the league’s top teams as Netanya will host the Yellow & Blue on Matchday 4. Last season Maccabi Tel Aviv won 3 of 4 meetings between the club’s.

25/26/27.9: Toto Cup Final (Date and time to be confirmed)
The Toto Cup Final will be played at the end of September unlike in prior seasons when it was contested in December. Maccabi will look to take home Back-to-Back titles when they face Maccabi Haifa for the trophy.

29.9: Maccabi Tel Aviv – Hapoel Tel Aviv, Netanya Stadium (Date and time to be confirmed)
The busy month will end with a Derby when Maccabi host’s Hapoel. The two squads have already faced each other this season when the Yellow & Blue dismantled the Reds 4:1 last month in the Toto Cup semifinals.
 

Over the past number of seasons, Maccabi Tel Aviv and Hapoel Beer Sheva have been the Israel Premier League Ligat Japanika leaders and this evening, Sunday September 2nd, the Yellow & Blue will travel to Toto-Turner to take on the southern Reds on Matchday 2.

Also on the Website:
In honor of the first day of school: What was it like for the Maccabi players to return to school?

In the video:
The first league win of the season

Maccabi Tel Aviv enters the match against Hapoel Beer Sheva after defeating Sarpsborg 2:1 this past Thursday, but were eliminated from continental play due to the aggregate score of the two legged tie. In league play, Vladimir Ivic’s side took home a 2:0 win over Maccabi Haifa on Matchday 1 and will look to pick up another 3 points in the desert city.

Beer Sheva drew 1:1 at Kiryat Shemona to open up their campaign and ended their European foray when they fell to APOEL Nicosia in the third qualifying round of the Europa League.

This will be the first match since Vidar Kjartansson joined Rostov from Russia while the last time the two sides met, a Dor Peretz goal handed the Yellow & Blue a 1:0 victory in last season’s championship playoffs which was also the first league loss by Beer Sheva at their home stadium.

Chico Ofoedu will be playing in his first match against the southern capital squad and he looked ahead to the contest: “I’ve heard about the games from a couple of friends as well as players like Nosa Igiebor, John Ogu and Tony Nwakaeme. It’s an exciting moment for me to be involved in action like this and I’m really looking forward to it.”

“It’s a big rivalry as the past three years Beer Sheva has been the champion and Maccabi wants to regain it,” added Ofoedu. “It will be an intense game and Nigerian Derby for me to play against John Ogu who is a National Team player. It will be a big game in our country.”

The Numbers between Maccabi and Beer Sheva

There have been 108 meetings to date between the clubs. The record: 51 Maccabi wins, 31 draws, 26 Beer Sheva victories.
Goal differential: 157:96 in favor of Maccabi
Dor Peretz’s winning goal last season was Beer Sheva’s first league loss at Turner Stadium after going undefeated for 51 straight matches.

Maccabi has handed Beer Sheva their most home defeats – 20.

In the last two meetings between the side’s on Matchday 2, the team that lost ended up winning the championship. In 2015/16 Maccabi defeated Beer Sheva who won the title while in 2002/03 Beer Sheva beat Maccabi who took home the championship.

Each of the last three meetings between Maccabi and Hapoel ended in 1:0 (Maccabi twice, Beer Sheva once).

The last seven matches all ended with one side defeating the other by only one goal. Maccabi has no such record against any other club.
Eliran Atar has the most goals of any other player on the current squad with 5.
Sheran Yeini has the most appearance of any other player on the current squad with 23 (4th all-time in Club history).

The new school year is here and now’s the time to wish good luck to all of the young Maccabists. In honor of the occasion, we checked with some of the Maccabi Stars to find out what type of students they were back in the day with the help of 6 questions.

1. What do you remember from the first day of school?
Yonatan Cohen: “I was very excited but then things settled down once I was with all of my friends.”
Dan Glazer: “I remember the first day of grade 7. I changed schools and went from elementary to high school. I was very excited about the change.”
Maor Kandil: “I felt a tremendous amount of pressure and excitement.”
Ruslan Barsky: “I remember the excitement of meeting my friends at school and beginning the new year.”

2. What class did you enjoy the most?
Cohen: “Sports of course! We always played football.”
Glazer: “Sports…as I wasn’t the greatest in many of the classes I was very happy that there was one class that I was the best at.”
Kandil: “Sports. Of course football was the best.”
Barsky: “Sports class. Most will agree with me that there’s nothing like playing football at school – everyone against everyone.”

3. Which class did you least enjoy?
Cohen: “History.”
Glazer: “Literature. It was difficult.”
Kandil: “History. It was boring, so much so that I fell asleep.”
Barsky: “History. I hope my teacher will forgive me.”

4. What did the teachers say about you?
Cohen: “I was wild but when I needed to be serious I was.”
Glazer: “The teachers really liked me a lot but at parent-teacher meetings they would tell my mother and father that I talked too much and disrupted the class too much in the middle of a lesson.”
Kandil: “Hyperactive.”
Barsky: “They always believed that I could get better scores and be a better student. They always tried to help me be the best I could be.”

5. What type of student were you really?
Cohen: “I was wild. The teachers were correct.”
Glazer: “I was always a good student with good grades. It wasn’t always easy because o football but I always gave the maximum.”
Kandil: “I admit that I wasn’t a star if I always did what I needed to.”
Barsky: “I was always a good student but I’m sure that I could have done even better.”

6. How did you combine football and your studies?
Cohen: “It was easy to combine football and school. I had many classes and tests but the club always helped me out the best they could.”
Glazer: “Thanks to my school Lady Davis, they were always there to help me in terms of my football and helped me make up school work when I had to fly with the club or national team. Luckily I was together with Yonatan Cohen in the same class and many times the teachers put together a calendar and schedule for us that was different than the rest of the class so we could make up the school work we missed. I had a lot of private tutoring and I always gave my maximum.”
Kandil: “I tried to rest a bit after school and then continue my lessons at the training facility before practice began.”
Barsky: “It’s a very important integration and combination of the two. I always believed that if I succeeded in school, I would succeed in football. They go together and I always tried my best to do the maximum in both. You need to understand the importance of being able to combine the two and that way you’ll be able to.”

Chico Ofoedu, Maccabi Tel Aviv’s striker looked ahead to Sunday night’s contest against Hapoel Beer Sheva at 21:00 at the Toto-Turner Stadium in the southern capital and can’t wait to get into the action:

Watch: Ofedu’s goal in the Derby

“I’ve heard about the games from a couple of friends as well as players like Nosa Igiebor, John Ogu and Tony Nwakaeme. It’s an exciting moment for me to be involved in action like this and I’m really looking forward to it.” 

The Beer Sheva Rivalry:
“It’s a big rivalry as the past three years Beer Sheva has been the champion and Maccabi wants to regain it. It will be an intense game and Nigerian Derby for me to play against John Ogu who is a National Team player. It will be a big game in our country.”

Keeping our heads up:
“We’re quite disappointed with the result. All of us gave our best from the coach, the players and the fans. We will keep our heads up and bounce back.”

Impact of the fans:
“The fans were amazing even when Sarpsborg scored, they kept us going all the way to the last minute. We know that they are disappointed but we are asking them to all come down to Beer Sheva. Let’s do it, let’s finish our work there and make it up to them. Come and support us the way we know that they can.”

Maccabi Tel Aviv and Russian side FC Rostov reached an agreement for the sale of Vidar Kjartansson.

Maccabi accepted an offer from Rostov to buy the 28-year-old Icelandic striker who joined the club two seasons ago.

Vidar, told the club’s official website: “I had two wonderful years here at Maccabi and would like to thank my teammates the fans and everyone at the club. Now I will be making the next step in my career but will always remain a fan of Maccabi and the city of Tel Aviv”.

CEO Ben Mansford, added: “Vidar came to Maccabi to score goals and he did just that. The time feels right for Vidar to leave and embark on his next chapter. Everyone at Maccabi wishes Vidar and his family all the best for the future”.

Vidar, scored 3 goals in 9 appearances this season and a total record of 48 goals in 98 appearances since joining Maccabi in the summer of 2016.

Sheran Yeini, the Yellow & Blue Captain spoke about his side’s 2:1 win which wasn’t enough to see Maccabi through to the Europa League Group Stages and shared his feelings about the contest:

“Anger would be the correct word. We are angry at ourselves. We didn’t have enough good chances in the first half and we picked up an unnecessary penalty.”

The better team in football sometimes doesn’t win:
“I think we are the better team, but in football the better team doesn’t always win. Football is more than just situations, the ball and goals. The match we played in Norway was over and we had to battle. So I’m not shocked, I’m angry.”

Comforting Eitan Tibi:
“I have him a hug on the pitch. He’s a professional and an Israel National Team player. We all make mistakes and we learn from them. I’m not concerned about his play going forward.”

Will the result in the Europa League influence play in the Israel Premier League:
“We lost and it’s an embarrassment that we lost and we didn’t advance to the Europa League Group Stages because we feel that we could have done better and for no other reason that anyone else may say. We are embarrassed because we really wanted to be a part of the competition because we feel that we are worth it. We will focus on the Israel Premier League and the disappointment from today won’t have any influence on Sunday’s match. We are athletes and know how to recover and it won’t play a factor on Sunday.”

Vladimir Ivic, the Maccabi Tel Aviv Head Coach spoke about his side’s disappointing 2:1 win over Sarpsborg which wasn’t enough to see the Yellow & Blue through to the Group Stages of the Europa League:

“It’s a big shock. We didn’t lose the game but we aren’t in the Europa League which was our target. I can’t say anything about the players as they played hard, created chances and scored two goals. This is football as we missed a lot of chances. We received a penalty and then we had a few chances to score. We have our next game in a few days and we have to now focus on the Israel Premier League, State Cup and Toto Cup. We have to work with the players and fix the mental side now.”

Giving up penalties in both legs:
“This is the one moment you need to make a decision and you make a wrong decision. We paid for our mistakes in the first game.”

Focusing on the other competitions:
“It’s was our target to qualify for the Europa League Group Stages. We worked very hard for that and we didn’t achieve this goal. Now we have to focus on the other competitions.”

About the squad:
“I can’t think about this now right after the game.”