Hapoel Haifa pounded Maccabi Haifa 5-1 to capture the Derby and send the greens into total disarray in what was the Carmel reds biggest win over their city rivals since 1952 when they won 7-1. Javon East who scored a hat-trick began the game with a pair of goals within the opening 30 minutes while Thiemoko Diarra added a third goal ahead of the break to give Hapoel a stunning 3-0 advantage over Maccabi. Diarra added his second of the match in the 50th minute while East scored his third marker two minutes later as Guy Melamed pulled back a strike in the 79th minute to break up the clean sheet against his former club.

“It feels great,” an exuberant Hapoel Head Coach Roni Levy began. “I’m glad the guys worked great and the crowd deserves to win a derby and have fun. On the surface, we have nothing to play for in the playoffs, but I’m not familiar with that concept. I have a long list of things I do play for and the players deserve this big bonus. I’m having a great time at Hapoel Haifa and I have a great connection with the players.”

“This is one of my difficult moments as a coach,” an embattled Barak Bachar acknowledged. “Nothing worked out from the first moment to the last. There’s nothing to analyze professionally as this was a difficult and shameful experience. It hurts and it’s unpleasant to hear the chants from the frustrated fans but I can understand the crowd. Obviously this game has consequences, right now we’re hurting, frustrated and we need to pick up the guys. It was a shameful game, we’re all to blame and I’m at the top. We need to sit quietly, take a breath and recover, look ahead to what we can do.”

Bnei Sakhnin slipped by Kiryat Shemona 1-0 as Alexandre Ramalingon scored the lone marker of the match to hand the visitors the win that ensured they would not be relegated to the second division.

“The truth is, I didn’t experience any pressure, there was tension and excitement, but the players gave me confidence,” Sakhnin bench boss Menachem Koretzky said. Although the tension is not healthy, the team came out of a tough situation. I’m glad the players internalized my demands and desires. Together we managed to win a series of head-to-head games against direct rivals and we brought the results we needed.”

Shai Barda shared his thoughts after his club’s fifth consecutive loss, “It’s not great to lose like this. We were one point from the championship playoffs and then we won the first game but from there things kind of snowballed with injuries we hadn’t experienced all season, plus early red cards.”

Hapoel Jerusalem downed Ironi Tiberias 3-1 as the capital city reds took care of business against the Kineret based team who are battling relegation. Before the game was 10 minutes old, the hosts grabbed a 2-0 lead as Noam Malmoud scored off a corner while Yanai Distelfeld doubled the advantage minutes later. Peter Michael pulled a goal back in the 64th minute but Ohad Almagor polished off the win with a 17 meter stunner twenty minutes later.

Tiberias coach Eliran Hodeida tried to encourage his players as they try to stave off relegation, “We won’t cry now about what happened here, it’s not important at this point. What’s important is that we have one game left, which is like a cup final. I believe if you to train hard and come next week to do the job, we will do it.”

Maccabi Petach Tikva and Ashdod played to a 1-1 draw as the sides split the points. Muhammed Knaan continued to score as he gave the port city squad a 1-0 lead as he headed home a Eugene Ansah ball in the 19th minute but less than a quarter hour later, Wilson Harris pounded in a rebound off a set piece to draw the hosts even as both teams took a point a piece for their efforts.
“It’s very difficult to manage a game when you are depending on results from other teams,” Petach Tikva coach Noam Shoham began. “When it was 2-1 for Hapoel Jerusalem in their game I changed my lineup. When you depend on other things, your team doesn’t play well either. We started great, but then we conceded a goal out of nowhere.”

“I said before the game that I think it will be an open game here, but in the second half it looked like that was not the case,” Ashdod bench boss Haim Silvas said. “Our start wasn’t good enough but the goal freed us up and we could have scored a second one too. We gave Petach Tikva chances on set pieces, which is something you shouldn’t do and at the end of the day one went in.”

Hapoel Hadera slipped by Maccabi Bnei Reineh 2-1 to take the 3-points and the win. Shlomi Azoulay scored the lone goal in the first half to give the visitors a lead but Chance Mondzenga found the equalizer early on in the second half. However, Gilad Avramov pounced on a rebound and scored the eventual winner in the 57th minute to hand the already relegated team the win.