Maccabi Tel Aviv and Maccabi Haifa played out a thrilling 1-1 draw at Bloomfield Stadium in front of a crowd of 25,101 at Bloomfield Stadium on Sunday night.

Prior to the game, Danny Miron, father of hostage Omri Miron, spoke in a stirring ceremony to mark the second anniversary of Hamas’s attack on Israel on October 7, 2023.

While the message of Miron’s speech was unity, once the game started it was a heated clash between two of Israeli soccer’s powerhouse clubs. Maccabi import Kristijan Belić earned a yellow card in just the 7th minute for errant challenge on Matías Nahuel, setting the tone for the game ahead. However the scoreboard was unaffected in the first half, with the visitors creating the best chances: in the 24th minute, Trivante Stewart found only Maccabi Tel Aviv keeper Roi Mishpati between him and the goals, but he hit the wrong side of the goalpost and the result was a goal kick; in the 33rd minute an almost catastrophic turnover from Maccabi Tel Aviv defender Tyrese Asante led to an open shot for Suf Podgoreanu, however his effort hit the crossbar and the home side was able to clear the ball; and in the 41st minute Podgoreanu again blasted a shot at the goals, but Mishpati was able to stop the ball.

Maccabi Tel Aviv coach Žarko Lazetić made two changes at the start of the second half, with Kervin Andrade and Ido Shahar making way for Elad Madmon and Itamar Noy. Noy made an immediate impact, stealing the ball from Abdoulaye Seck in the box and then putting the ball past Haifa goalkeeper Shareef Keouf to give the home team a 1-0 lead after 46 minutes. In the 63rd minute Noy almost doubled the home team’s score, but his effort after a rebound from captain Dor Peretz’s shot hit the crossbar to the relief of Maccabi Haifa fans.

In the 83rd minute, Asante dribbled the ball into the Haifa box, where defender Lisav Eissat not-so-subtly pulled on his shirt, resulting in a penalty for the Yellow & Blue – however the decision was overruled as both players appeared to be bulling on each other’s shirts. Only minutes later in the 87th minute, Ethan Azoulay was awarded a penalty after an errant tackle in the home side’s box from Mohamed Ali Camara. Former Maccabi Tel Aviv player Đorđe Jovanović – in his return to Bloomfield – took the penalty and converted to help the Greens take a point from the road game.

“The most important thing is the disappointment when you have the chances to score and you play a very good match,” Haifa coach Diego Flores said after the game. “You had the chances, especially in the first half, you play a Classico away and you feel you have to win and the guys, the players did a big effort and you don’t get a result. At the end, I’m very happy with the effort and the football our players bring to this stadium and I’m disappointed because I think we could have won this match.”

“We didn’t ask for the ball enough and didn’t attack the space,” Lazetić said after the game. “The team didn’t look like it should. After in the second half we expected that it would be better and that’s what happened.”

“Of course it’s disappointing,” Mishpati said after the game. “It is frustrating to get a penalty in the 90th minute.”

Maccabi Tel Aviv, on 14 points after leaving 4 points on the field in their past two outings, now sits behind Hapoel Beer Sheva, which leads the league on 18 points by taking all available points in the first 6 rounds. Maccabi Haifa sits in 8th place in the table on 8 points.

In Sunday night’s other fixture, Bnei Sakhnin defeated a 9-man Maccabi Netanya in Netanya 2-1, with Iyad Abu Abaid’s injury time penalty breaking the deadlock following a red card to
Heriberto Moreno Borges Tavares, after Sakhnin’s Ahmad Taha’s goal in the 34th minute was cancelled out by Maor Levi in the 64th minute. Denis Kulikov was also sent off late in the first half.

“Every game 9 against 11? This time it was in our favor — that’s the beauty of football,” Bnei Sakhnin coach Sharon Mimar said after the game. “I hope we’ll always stay with 11 players on the pitch. We didn’t start the match well — Netanya deserved to equalize, maybe even more. We’ll learn from this. The team is in a process, and we’ve played seven fewer matches than the other teams. It’s a process, and we’re learning. I’m happy it came after a sweet and well-deserved 90th-minute win. We could have finished the game already in the first half.”

Netanya coach Yossi Abukasis spoke after the painful loss: “I understood there was a stupid foul — a punch to the face. I’m angry about that play, especially after what Denis Kolikov did in the first half — we should have learned from it. We didn’t lose because of football, but because of nonsense — with the two red cards we got. We played an excellent match, and it’s a shame — we lost the game because of our own stupidity.”

All teams now have a week off during the international window, with Israel facing Norway (Saturday October 11 at 19:00 IDT) and Italy (Tuesday October 14 at 21:45 IDT) in World Cup qualifier matchdays 7 and 8 next week.