Maccabi Tel Aviv fell to Midtjylland 3-0 as Dju Franculino scored a brace to help the visitors to the win. After a fairly even opening 40 minutes in Serbia which has acted as the yellow-and-blues home away from home since the outbreak of the war, Franculino found the back of the goal just ahead of the break as his volley beat keeper Roi Mishpati for a 1-0 lead. Philip Billing added an insurance marker in the 71st minute while Franculino polished off his brace with a strike less than a quarter hour later to wrap up the victory.

“It’s hard to accept the result,” Maccabi Tel Aviv Head Coach Zarko Lazetic said. “The performance was very good, except for the result. Before the third goal we had an amazing chance. We have to score. We created a lot against such a tough team, and we deserved more. We need to score goals from the chances we create. We allowed them to score the first and third goals too easily. We’re missing several players, but that’s not an excuse. We have to believe more, and that’s how we’ll win.”

Osher Davida also spoke about the defeat, “At this level, if you don’t score, you’re going to concede, that’s just how it is. If you don’t score, you’ll pay for it. I’m very disappointed with this game. We already have European experience and we need to do better. We have five much tougher matches ahead and we’ll try to give our maximum. Next year, we can’t just settle for compliments again.”