Patrick Van Leven and Maccabi Tel Aviv had 72 hours to celebrate the 1: 3 over Maccabi Netanya and prepare for the season game against Maccabi Haifa that will be held tomorrow (Wednesday) in Bloomfield. This is of course a game that is a crossroads for the champion, while a victory will reduce the gap from the Greens to five points and leave the championship fight alive, and on the other hand a loss will open a difficult gap to reduce by 11 points.
Van Leven, who was not happy about the victory over Netanya, expects his players to surpass the ability they showed on Saturday, with an emphasis on the passing attacks that he requires to perform at a higher pace. This morning, the Dutch coach will hold the concluding training session, in which he will have to make decisions about the degree of workload he will place on certain players. While Dan Glazer and Eitan Tibi managed to hold a full training session last night and the two are fit to compete, the fitness of Alexander Peshich will be tested today, with the assessment that even if he does not start at 11 he will still be included in the squad.
Apart from Dor Peretz, who will be absent from the game due to the accumulation of yellow cards, it seems that Yonatan Cohen, who suffers from a slight strain in the twin muscles, is not expected to take part in the match, when he did not participate in training yesterday and is expected to focus on treatments and reinforcements. Matan Hozaz, Elon Almog and Eduardo Guerrero are expected to fight for his place in the squad.
No less than a decade has passed since the last time Maccabi Haifa won at Bloomfield and this happened in its championship season (2010/11). This figure does not give rest to the club members and the vigilance in Kiryat Shalom accordingly, when above all motivates the players the burden of proof: “This is a game for our honor,” players said. “We got into a period when things were not so bad and people had the illusion that we were weakened. Maccabi Tel Aviv did not rise and fall on one player and a victory will silence everyone.”
