Maccabi Haifa defeated Hapoel Haifa 2-0 as Dean David scored a second half brace to hand the Greens the 3-points and the win to stay in the championship race. After a goalless first half, Frantzdy Pierrot sent David a through ball that he put past the Carmel Reds keeper Yoav Gerafi in the 72nd minute to break the deadlock while two minutes later David found the back of the goal from 16 meters out to sew up the victory.

“Hapoel Haifa is a very good defensive club,” Maccabi Haifa head coach Messay Dego began. “We had to figure out when was best to press them. I was a bit upset as to how we played in the first half, but we took some chances in the second half. The dream is stillalove and if we still have a chancer to win the title we will do our utmost.”

“We had a very weak day and we couldn’t control the ball at all,” Hapoel Haifa Head Coach Roni Levy said. Unfortunately that didn’t help our cause. When we play an open style of game that doesn’t play to our advantage and every loss especially a Derby is a bitter defeat for us and the fans.”

Hapoel Beer Sheva got by Bnei Sakhnin 2-1 as the southern reds came back from a deficit to take the victory. Following a goalless opening half, Basil Khuri scored off a counter attack in the 57th minute but a Dor Hugi own goal three minutes later evened up the score. However, Constantinos Soteriou picked up a red card resulting in a Helder Lopes penalty that he calmly slotted home to give Beer Sheva the slim win.

“This was a crazy game,” Beer Sheva beach boss Eliyaniv Barda said. “The game began to our advantage and we had chances but we couldn’t score. The guys worked very hard and we are the best home team in the league. We want to play our best and collect as many points as we can over the course of the next month.”

“We were leading 1-0 and we tried to pressure Beer Sheva,” Sakhnin coach Slobodan Drapic said. “Not every club will go and do that. We made mistakes and lost the game. We are trying to get more and more of our young players time to play and from there we will see what we have for next season.”