The Israel Football Association State Cup draw took place this afternoon as Maccabi Tel Aviv was chosen to visit Ramat Nir HaSharon of the Leumit League in the Round of 32. The match will take place on either January 12th or 13th. Nir Levin, the Maccabi Youth Department Director was responsible for the drawing.

if you recall, last season Maccabi Tel Aviv began their “Path to the Cup” in the Round of 32 against Beitar Tel Aviv/Ramle where the Yellow-and-Blue won by a score of 4:1 as Barak Itzhaki picked up a brace. Maccabi then defeated Hapoel Ashkelon, Ironi Kiryat Shemona, Maccabi Ahi Nazareth and Hapoel Beer Sheva 6:2 on their way to an unprecedented Treble.

Ironi Ramat HaSharon has played the past two seasons in the Leumit League and currently sits in 5th place with 7 victories, just two points shy of a place on the table that could lead them to promotion back to the WINNER League. Lior Zada’s squad has at least one ex-Maccabi player in Yossi Shivchon and has gone three straight matches without a win in league play.

Gal Alberman, the Yellow-and-Blue’s stalwart defensive midfielder discussed the club’s next game on Matchday 16 against Ironi Kiryat Shemona on Sunday December 27th at Bloomfield Stadium, 20:55. The veteran spoke about giving 100% no matter what the situation, matches at Bloomfield, helping his teammates and battling for the title:

“Just like the coach said we are professionals and we are looking forward to the next match. We’ve been through this in the past. He is on our sidelines and we have to give 100%. We’ll do a video review and a regular practice after the press conference. Remember we’ve gone through this before and we still won the league championship.”

Giving it all:

“The players aren’t part of every last detail and we don’t know everything. He’s our coach right now and he’s obligated to coach us and he’s part of this club. We want to make sure we give it all in every match we have. We have some interesting games coming up that are very important for us. These things happen and we just have to adjust to the situation.”

On having lost a number of matches at Bloomfield this season:

“I don’t like to look at statistics and see how many points we may have lost at Bloomfield. There are many stats that are out there and what has been going on at Bloomfield is what it is right now. We have to pick up points both away and home and every match is worth 3-points. It doesn’t really interest us what our record was at Bloomfield in comparison to last year or the year before. Each season is its own entity.”

Helping his teammates on the pitch:

“I very much enjoy being at Maccabi and I want to play as many minutes as I can in order to help my teammates on the pitch. I want to keep working hard so that I can continue to feature in the starting lineup. I would be happy to be part of Maccabi for years to come.”

Focusing on themselves and not on the opposition:

“It’s hard to say who the favorite is. Beer Sheva will say one thing and we will say that it’s up to us. Every team has to look at themselves and see what they can do. We don’t like to deal with the other teams but ourselves.”

Being strong enough to fight for the championship:

“I’ve been sitting here for six years and especially over the past three seasons I’ve heard that this year is not what it was last year. I believe we are strong enough to battle for the league title and I’m sure we will be in the race the whole season. If someone thinks otherwise then that’s their prerogative.”

Yellow-and-Blue Head Coach Slavisa Jokanovic is getting his club ready for their WINNER League match against Kiryat Shemona this coming Sunday night December 27th, 20:55 at Bloomfield Stadium. After falling to Hapoel Beer Sheva 2:1 last match, Maccabi will be preparing in earnest for their next game. The coach also discussed the latest news concerning his career:

“I understand your interest about the news reports but I’m here to talk about the upcoming match and we’re preparing for the next game which is worth 3-points. I believe we are in good position to lift the trophy at the end of the season.”

Focussing on the next match:

“This is a press conference about my team, what happened last game and what will be in the next few matches. I don’t want to talk about myself and I prefer not to make any comments about my future. I am here to look ahead to the next game which will be a tough one against Kiryat Shemona.”

Life in Tel Aviv:

“I am here under contract, I’m a professional football coach and I’m ready to do my job. I enjoy my life here in Tel Aviv and have met some very interesting people in this country and it’s a nice place to live and work. I’m enjoying my time here in Israel.”

Concentrating on playing:

“I work with professional adult players and we will push forward. People may have commented that we lost the Beer Sheva game because of these rumors but we did a lot of good things in the match. I’ve been in many dressing rooms and it’s important for the players to concentrate on the upcoming matches and not worry themselves about other things.”

Maccabi Tel Aviv’s central defender Carlos Garcia spoke to the assembled press following the WINNER League Matchday 15 clash against Hapoel Beer Sheva that ended in a 2:1 loss to the desert Reds. The Spaniard opened with remarks concerning who the better team was on the Bloomfield pitch:

“I can’t argue with what the Beer Sheva coach said but I have another opinion. Maybe we have to watch it again. They can be happy that they didn’t do very much to take the three points.”

The season is a marathon, not a sprint:

“My head is never down. I’m proud of my team and I’m proud of my fans. Like I’ve said before the celebrations will come in May and I’m sure that we can do a better job and make sure we are ahead of Beer Sheva at that time.”

Looking ahead:

“I can say that because of the way we played today we deserved more. But we lost and Beer Sheva is three points ahead of us. If we both make the playoffs then we will have two more games against each other. I hope that at the end of the season we can say, yes we lost these games but did the work that we needed to do in order to win the championship.”

Mistakes on the goals scored by Beer Sheva:

“The two goals that we gave up were our mistakes and many times in football this is what happens. We could have avoided it and after they scored they went and defended for 90 minutes. That’s one way to play football.”

About tomorrow:

“I was down for two seconds after the game but now we have to pick ourselves up and do the best training tomorrow that we can do.”

Maccabi Tel Aviv Head Coach Slavisa Jokanovic discussed his side’s 2:1 defeat at the hands of Beer Sheva on Matchday 15 of the WINNER League at Bloomfield Stadium. The loss moves the Yellow-and-Blue down the table to second place, three points behind the desert Reds:

“Congratulating to Beer Sheva. They played a strong game and scored two very fast goals. We played a good game and in the second half we tried to play more offensively. Later in the match we made another switch to press them further. The team tried to do many things to find goals but we weren’t strong enough to collect one point.”

On the first Beer Sheva goal:

“We played a decent football game and made one mistake at the start of the match. There were many minutes where we played good football and tried to keep the team in the game.”

Solutions to find more scoring:

“Dasa scored the goal but we are trying to find a solution to this problem and we’ve tried to fix this issue in the summer and have used various players. But we haven’t yet found the answer.”

Ben Basat in starting lineup:

“He helped us press the opposition and our football was ok in the first half. He was part of the attack and I made a substitution in the second half to change things up.”

Head Coach Slavisa Jokanovic began the match with a back four of Eli Dasa, Tal Ben Haim, Carlos Garcia and Omri Ben Harush in front of keeper Predrag Rajkovic. Gal Alberman, Nosa Igiebor, Dor Peretz and Gili Vermouth manned the midfield while striker Eden Ben Basat made his return to the starting lineup with the captain Eran Zahavi right behind him.

Both teams started the match looking for a goal but it was the visitors from Beer Sheva who struck first. In the 3rd minute Maor Melikson delivered a ball into the Maccabi box from the right side that glanced off defender Ben Harush right to Hapoel captain Elyaniv Barda who put it behind Rajkovic to take a very quick 1:0 lead. Minutes later Maccabi put the pedal to the medal looking for an equalizer, however Igiebor’s attempt from just outside of the Beer Sheva box missed Goresh’s goal by inches.

Zahavi’s 16th minute effort from 17 meters out also just went wide of the right post as Maccabi continued to mount pressure trying to draw even. In the 26th minute Zahavi’s masterful deep cross found Dasa on the right side of the box with no one to beat but the keeper but his 6 meter shot went wide to the left of the goal.

After Beer Sheva defender Shir Tzedek picked up the game’s first yellow card in the 31st minute, the desert Reds scored their second goal of the match in the 39th minute to double their lead to 2:0. Mahran Radi passed the ball quickly up to Melikson just across the midfield and beat an oncoming Rajkoivic who was way out of his area to score from roughly 40 meters out.

The Yellow-and-Blue would have a chance to cut the lead when Vermouth found Zahavi in the box but his header just went by the post to keep the score at 2:0 in favor of Beer Sheva as the sides headed into the break.

Jokanovic made a pair of substitutions to begin the second half in order to jump start the stagnant Maccabi offense bringing in winger Tal Ben Chaim and striker Barak Itzhaki in favor of Ben Basat and Peretz. But just minutes into the half Ben Chaim and Igiebor each picked up a yellow card from referee Ziv Adler. As midfield play dominated the majority of the second frame, the yellow card parade continued with Dasa, Barda, Garcia, Ben Turgeman and Itzhaki all collecting one.

In the 84th minute out of nowheres, the Yellow-and-Blue finally broke through the stingy Beer Sheva defense as Dasa’s effort from an Alberman free kick hit off of Barda and bounced into the goal to cut the lead to 2:1. Unfortunately for Maccabi it wasn’t enough on this night as attack after attack was stopped in its tracks by Beer Sheva as the visitors collected the three points and the win.