Israel fell to Ireland 3-0 in UEFA Nations League play in a match that was for all intents and purposes over by the halftime break. Ireland broke open the game in the 14th minute as Troy Parrott took a perfect ball from James Abankwah after an error on defense by Raz Shlomo as he beat keeper Daniel Peretz for a 1-0 lead. Just two minutes later Jack Moylan sent a through ball to Adam Idah who easily beat the blue-and-white defenders to double the advantage. Finally Nikita Stoyanov lost the ball as Moylan latched onto it and sent it past a helpless Peretz for a 3-0 lead by the 25th minute as Ireland closed out the victory with ease.

Ran Ben Shimon spoke about the defeat, “We started the game embarrassingly. It was an embarrassment. All of the people that were at home watching this game was tough. We will need to really take a good hard look at what went wrong and although we prepared really well for this match I have to take the blame for that. We deserve all of the criticism that we will be levied upon us over the next few days. I have to apologize to everyone for this.”

Captain Eli Dasa, one of the most experienced players in Ran Ben Shimon’s squad, came on as a substitute and summed up the disappointment following the match, “There is no good way to explain it. We failed and failed miserably today. There’s no need to hide behind anything. It’s an enormous disappointment and I have no other way to describe it. I’ve made 80 appearances for the national team and this is undoubtedly the most painful game. It’s a tremendous disappointment. Our hearts are aching over how the game unfolded and how it ended.”

The defender added, “We take full responsibility for what happened. The coaching staff did a fantastic job preparing us and gave us a very good game plan, but we didn’t come out and perform. The responsibility lies 100% with the players. All the outside noise was irrelevant. When it came to the result and the way we wanted to play, we failed miserably. The pressure didn’t affect us; we simply didn’t show up. Period.”

West Ham United star Manor Solomon also spoke about the disappointment, “I agree that it’s a disgrace. We have no words. We’re all heartbroken and we knew how important this game was to us and to the entire country. We started the game in the worst possible way. The first half was terrible and afterward, it was very difficult to come back, even though we wanted to. We need to look at ourselves, each and every one of us, in the mirror, because we simply didn’t show up today. All of us, as a team, need to pick ourselves up from this. It’s going to be very difficult, but we’ll do it.”

“We tried as much as possible not to focus on everything going on around us, but apparently, we couldn’t get it out of our heads, or perhaps we didn’t take it into account enough. We knew how important this game was for every citizen in the country, and we wanted to make everyone happy. Unfortunately, that wasn’t reflected on the pitch. We didn’t show up in the first half, and we’re extremely disappointed.”