Hapoel Jerusalem stunned Maccabi Haifa 2-1 at Teddy Stadium leaving over 15,000 Green fans thoroughly disappointed after having made the long trek to the capital city. Omer Atzily scored his 20th goal of the season by latching onto a terrific Pierre Cornud pass to gave the visitors a 1-0 lead in the 68th minute as it looked as if Haifa was going to move ever so closer to wrapping up the league title. However, a handball in the box gave Guy Badash the opportunity to draw the reds even which he did when he slammed the ball by Josh Cohen in the 81st minute. Ziv Arie’s squad wasn’t going to be satisfied with a split of the points and looked for a shocking winner which they found in the 90th minute. Harel Shalom made his way by defender Daniel Sundgren and found Ofek Bitton in the area who beat Barak Bachar’s keeper to snatch the 3-points and send the home fans into delirium.

“We had some good minutes and I thought we could do even more,” Arie explained following the victory. “Maccabi Haifa didn’t have 200 chances, they ahd some good ones but this was a win from the guys with a lot of heart. We aren’t a team with a huge budget or with amazing talent or quality. We knew that this game was going to be tough defensively but we come to play against every club.”

“After how this game developed, I am still in shock,” Bachar said after the match. “We were dominant, we missed chances and we also rightfully took the lead. But ultimately we lost on those two late opportunities which ended this game cruelly. That’s soccer and unfortunately it went against us in this game. I felt we were going to win, but just as in every year we will have to do it the hard way.”

The game winning goal scorer Ofek Bitton also spoke about the win, “I’m so happy especially after not having scored in such a long time. We played really well and it was our third win in a row. Scoring goals this season has been something that I have been working on and I’m very excited about that.”

Maccabi Tel Aviv and Ashdod drew 1-1 as the yellow-and-blue lost an opportunity to get back into the championship race after the Haifa loss. Elton Acolatse broke a goalless deadlock in with a 72nd minute penalty following a handball in the box, but Eran Zahavi’s header earned the hosts a split of the points.

“Yet another game that we had endless amounts of chances to win and we just couldn’t,” Maccabi coach Aitor Karanka said. “Zahavi is a player that can always score and that goal helped us as we continue on towards the end of the season.”

“The team continues to do some great things this season and there was a great atmosphere at Bloomfield Stadium for this game. This was even after Haifa lost and there was huge pressure on us,” Ashdod bench boss Ran Ben Shimon said.

Bnei Sakhnin downed Beitar Jerusalem 4-3 in a goalfest that took place at the Moshava Stadium in Pesach Tikva due to a radius penalty handed down to the capital city side. Guy Melamed opened the scoring in the 27th minute while Dor Hugi found the back of the goal just ahead of the break to head to hand Sakhnin a 2-0 advantage.

However deep into first half injury time Beram Kayal was sent off with gave Jerusalem a man to the good for the second half. Melamed added his second goal of the game early on in half number two but Yarden Shua fed Danilo Asprilla to help get Beitar on the scoreboard but downs 3-1. Hugi completed his brace in the 78th minute but less than a minute later Ofir Kriaf once again cut into the score while Ion Nicolaescu brought the hosts to within a goal. in get 85 the minute. But it was too little too late as time wound down and Sakhin wrapped up the victory.

“It’s very disappointing to give up 4 goals on 4 plays as we did a ton of nonsense,” Beitar coach Yossi Abuksis said. “Our defensive game was catastrophic and it was rough to see so many individual errors. In the second half we also made a lot of errors but we were able to create some chances.”

“It’s not easy to play 65-70 minutes with ten players and we still lead 3-0 and then 4-1,” Sakhnin coach Kobi Refuah said. “We were under pressure but the end of the game was very sweet. The fans enjoyed it more than I did but ultimately the win was the most important thing. We played well in what was one of our best games this season.”

Maccabi Netanya hosted Hapoel Beer Sheva to a 1-1 draw as the southern squad missed a chance to cut down Maccabi Haifa’s leas atop the table. Sagiv Yehezkel gave the reds a 1-0 lead in the 10th minute, but a quarter hour later Stabislav Bilenkyi found the back of the goal for the diamond city squad to split the points.

“We were too pressured coming into this game,” a throughly disappointed Beer Sheva coach Elyaniv Barda began. “Those who played had to give much more. I am very unhappy about our first half but we made adjustments and we controlled the pace of play for twenty minutes in the second half but then we went back to not playing well. We knew that we needed to win and pressure is part of a soccer players life.”

“We have packed well defensively but the difference is our heart,” Netanya coach Ron Kozuk said. “We spoke about how we needed to set the tone defensively in order to get back on track and that is exactly what we were able to do. In soccer you have periods of time that are going well and some less the key is to get back the momentum as quickly as possible.”

Bnei Reineh recorded a big 2-1 win over Sektzia Nes Ziona in their battle to stay in the Premier League next season. Shlomi Azulay gave Reineh a 1-0 lead at the stroke of halftime via a header but Stephane Acka notched the equalizer off a corner in the 70the minute. However, just two minutes later Amit Meir found himself wide open and sent the eventual winner into the Nes Ziona goal as Reineh took the 3-points.

Hapoel Hadera and Kiryat Shemona played to a 1-1 draw as the northerners are now firmly entrenched in the relegation zone. Steven Alfred gave Hadera a 1-0 lead but then were reduced to 10-men in the 72nd minute due to a second yellow card to keeper Roby Levkovich leading to late game drama. Ivan Bakhar was able to tie the game up but Slobodan Drapic’s squad couldn’t find the winner as the sides split the points.

“One could see who the dominant team was on the pitch,” Drapic began. “There are sometimes tough seasons but over the course of the last there games we came back from a deficit. We have four more games until the end of the campaign and we will battle all the way until the end.”

“I’m very disappointed and we lost two points in added time,” Hadera coach Menachem Koretzky said. “I knew that Kiryat Shemona would come back and it is really painful. I hope that from here on we don’t get messed up anymore as there is a long way to go until the end of the season.”

Hapoel Haifa blanked Hapoel Tel Aviv 1-0 thanks to Alon Turgeman’s 4th minute goal to give the Carmel reds the points.

“I feel very good and I’m happy that we won,” Roni Levy began. “Over the course of the last few games we played well but we couldn’t get the result in our favor. Even in this game we had plenty of chances and we couldn’t score which made the game more difficult because Hapoel Tel Aviv is a good team that sent many players forward on the attack.”

“We aren’t in a state that we can concede an early goal,” Hapoel Tel Aviv coach Haim Silvas said. “We had to chase after Haifa and we were better than them but we weren’t sharp enough in front of the goal. We had a few chances that we needed to find the equalizer on but unfortunately we weren’t able to.”