Maccabi Tel Aviv defeated Maccabi Haifa 3-1 as the yellow-and-blue dominated the Israeli Classico to take the 3-points and keep their title hopes alive dropping the gap to first place Hapoel Beer Sheva to eight points. Varela opened the scoring off a Haifa turnover to give Maccabi an early lead in the 15th minute while Sayed Abu Farkhi doubled the advantage in first half injury time to head into the break holding a 2-0 lead. Trivante Stewart was then Issued a straight red card for his reckless foul on Itamar Noy to lose a player for the final half hour of play. However, Guy Melamed pulled a marker back to halve the lead but Ido Shachar scored from the penalty spot after there was a handball in the box to close out the victory.

The yellow-and-blue Head Coach Ronny Deila reflected on the match, |”In the first half, especially the first 25 minutes, we played very well. They scored two goals that were disallowed and we responded with a goal before halftime, it was an important goal. After that, in the second half, they didn’t create too much, but on the other hand, we also didn’t play particularly well. We could have moved the ball better and created more chances. Our intensity dropped and that’s something you can’t allow, no matter where we’re playing. It’s a good win that puts us in a strong position. We need to keep going and we’re already looking ahead to Tuesday.”

Maccabi Haifa’s bench boss Barak Bachar spoke about the defeat, “There’s not much to say in a situation like this. Clearly, the season hasn’t been good. We tried to bring a bit of joy to the fans, but we didn’t manage to do that. We need to put our heads down, apologize to the supporters and keep moving forward this season. We can’t look at next year, we have to focus on the here and now. There aren’t many options; we’ll evaluate the players.”

Hapoel Tel Aviv slipped by Hapoel Petach Tikva 1-0 as Daniel Dappa scored from inside of the box after taking a beautiful pass from Loizos Lozou to help the reds to the 3-points as they try to punch their ticket to European qualifying.

Hapoel Tel Aviv Head Coach Elyaniv Barda spoke about the win and Daniel Dappa’s contribution, “I’m very happy for him. He worked very hard for a very long time and I’m really glad it finally went in for him. It definitely helped the team, which is the most important thing. We earned three very important points in our fight for a place in Europe. I think that in the end it was quite an even match, even though in the first half we controlled the game and it was our best pressing performance.”

Hapoel Petach Tikva Head Coach Omer Peretz, who only recently agreed to a contract extension with the club, spoke after the defeat, ‘When you concede a goal so late in the match, there’s great disappointment. It’s possible that Hapoel Tel Aviv were better in terms of flow, but in terms of chances we created good opportunities and could have scored.”

Maccabi Netanya blanked Bnei Sahknin 3-0 as the diamond city side received first half gold from Basam Zaarura and Oz Bilu while Heriberto Tavares found the back of the goal in the second half to wrap up the 3-points for Roni Levy’s team.

“We started the match well,” Netanya bench boss Roni Levy said. “I’m beginning to see many things here that I like and there’s a good attitude. The day-to-day conduct is just as important, and I see a very significant improvement in how we look. We need to maintain this over a longer period.”

Sakhnin Head Coach Yossi Abukasis summed up the match, “It started with the throw-in, that’s where we let them into the game. After that, on the second goal, we made a big mistake. We couldn’t lift up the players, because many of them know they won’t continue, so they didn’t have the drive. We weren’t there from the very first moment.”

Maccabi Bnei Reineh downed Ashdod 2-1 as Vitale Damascan’s 60th minute goal cancelled out Ayi Ochayi’s earlier strike and Antonio Sefer’s penalty gave the Galilee side the win and the 3-points to continue the climb out of the league’s cellar.

Hapoel Jerusalem and Hapoel Haifa played to a goalless draw as the capital city reds dropped into the relegation zone and now find themselves behind Ironi Tiberias who defeated Hapoel Kiryat Shemona 2-0 on first half goals by Sambinha and Stanislav Bilenkyi.

Lior Zada, Jerusalem’s Head Coach said, “It’s not a simple situation and it’s not easy. We’re in a relegation battle and no one expected us to suddenly look like Manchester City or Barcelona. Right now we need to play much more direct football, we’re trying to be more efficient. There were also some good things: good energy, and we didn’t concede.”

Tiberias Bench boss Eliran Hodeida spoke about keeping up the the fine momentum, “We don’t want to jinx it as we’re happy with both the defense and the attack, happy with the three points and with the football we showed in the first half. We’ve only just begun the journey, every goal matters, and we’ll need to stay focused ahead of Wednesday.”