Hapoel Tel Aviv blanked Hapoel Beer Sheva 2-0 as the visitors scored a goal in each half thanks to a pair of Ran Binyamin steals and assists to advance to the final of the Toto Cup Preseason Tournament. Tel Aviv got on the board when Binyamin stole the ball in the middle of the pitch, sent a perfect pass to Liran Rotman who shook off Beer Sheva captain Miguel Vitor and scored off his own rebound in the 38th minute to give Elyaniv Barda’s squad a 1-0 lead.

Binyamin again stripped the southern reds of the ball, waltzed into the box and gave youngster Amit Lemkin a nifty ball that the latter pounded past a helpless Niv Eliasi to add the insurance goal in the 67th minute and send the newly promoted club to the championship game.

Hapoel Tel Aviv assistant coach Dusan Matovic, who was on the sidelines in place of the Elyaniv Barda who is serving a two match sideline ban, summed up the match, “We played an excellent game and throughout the entire 90 minutes we worked well tactically, scored two goals and created even more chances. The players deserve all the credit. I’m happy that we played a good game, but there are also things we need to improve. Everyone who played did an amazing job. But as I had said in the previous Toto Cup games that this is preparation for the league so we have to stay grounded. Next week it’s money time when the league begins against Kiryat Shemona.”

Hapoel Beer Sheva bench boss Ran Kozuk said, “It’s very disappointing to lose in front of our fans and also lose a chance to win the title. You can’t make two mistakes like we did and want to win football games, it just won’t work. We’ve had a hard time scoring goals so far, but if we look at the game a little differently, I think for 35 minutes there was one team on the field, we moved them from side to side and got back the balls that we lost, but we didn’t create shots on goal as we should have.”

Liran Rotman who scored the opening goal of the game added, “This was an exciting contest, an excellent one to boot. Our supporters came to Beer Sheva in huge numbers and cheered us on the entire game and they deserve a good word for their efforts. Of course, it’s also fun to score my first goal of the season but now we’re already looking towards the league. This is not a victory that can be taken for granted, against an excellent team on a difficult pitch. I think we’ll see many more victories like this against some of the big teams.”

Beer Sheva defender Matan Balatxa said, “We really wanted to win, but it didn’t work out. We controlled the game, but we made mistakes and paid for them. When you make mistakes like that, you can’t win. It’s hard to put your finger on what’s not working for us. Maybe we’re not producing enough. It’s a team game, we need everyone from the goalkeeper to the striker to do better with the ball.”

In Toto Cup classification games, Heriberto Tavares scored the lone goal in Maccabi Netanya’s 1-0 win over Kiryat Shemona, Noam Gisin slotted home the winner in Hapoel Petach Tikva’s 3-2 victory over Ironi Tiberias while Bnei Sakhnin beat Ashdod 2-2 (5-4 on penalties after mounting a late game comeback with a pair of goals in second half injury time.