As soon as the match sheet came out with the Beitar Jerusalem starting lineup for their Israel State Cup quarterfinal clash against second division Bnei Yehuda one could easily see that this was not the usual XI that head coach Barak Itzhaki will normally roll out. For all intents and purposes the match was decided before the players even stepped foot on the pitch to warm up.

Arial Mendy, the Senegalese left back, Israeli striker Dor Hugi along with countryman central defender Gil Cohen were all in the lineup and while that is fine in most cup clashes where the bench boss wants to use some of the other players in his squad. However, Itzhaki and Beitar Jerusalem didn’t have the luxury to slot in a trio of players who have not been regulars in a do or die, win or go home matchup.

And with that Itzhaki and Beitar paid the ultimate price of being ousted by Bnei Yehuda after having played one of their worst, if not their worst halves of football this season.

It looked as if the players have never really played with each other and in fact that was the case; they never really did play with one another in arguably the most important game up to this point in this season. This was a critical mistake and one that Itzhaki can not go back and correct.

The cherry on top of the defeat was the foolish red card that first choice keeper Miguel Silva picked up when he spiked Elad Sahaf in the box for no apparent reason which will now result in the shot stopper from missing the top of the table clash against Beer Sheva.

Sure, there are lessons that Itzhaki will learn and hopefully implement in time to keep Beitar’s league chances stay alive with a huge top of the table battle at Hapoel Beer Sheva in a game that will not have any yellow-and-black supporters due to a penalty levied by the Israel Football Association. But with the Cup now done, those corrections will need to be put into play so to speak as quickly as possible as Beitar enters the clash at the southern reds one point away from first place.

A few things that Itzhaki can easily take away from the loss to Bnei Yehuda is that Mendy’s time at Beitar has come to an end and sports director Almog Cohen can go and find him a new home before the transfer window comes to a close. Hugi can only come off of the bench where he has been superb and lethal in fact helping the yellow-and-black take some points over the stretch that they did not lose any games in league play, a streak that is still alive that began at the beginning of November.

Luka Gadrani who would have been on the pitch instead of Gil Cohen should not have purposely picked up a yellow card last game in order to make sure he would play against Beer Sheva as he was missing especially on the pair of goals that saw the Beitar defense totally collapse in one fell swoop. The Georgian central defender was sorely missed on the back line as well as how he keeps everyone around him cool, calm and collected in a game that so desperately needed him in that roll.

Or not having right back Grigori Morozov in the squad because of the fear he would collect a 5th yellow card and then be ruled ineligible for Beer Sheva as he did score last match against Hapoel Haifa.

It was just one mistake following the next even after Itzhaki has preached for months that Beitar is taking it just one game at a time and not looking any further ahead. That’s a lot of lip service and hog wash. One needn’t look any further than this match to know that Itzhaki was without a question looking forward to Beer Sheva.

Itzhaki didn’t want to hear the word crisis prior to the cup match be brought up after a pair of league draws that saw Beitar fall out of first place. While this may not be a crisis so to speak, he still needs to figure out a way to stop the snowball that may begin to pick up speed heading down the mountain.

Beitar is still without arguably their most important offensive force in Omer Atzily whose injury status seems to get more cloudy each and every time its discussed with no one really wanting to admit what the real issue is and when he may return to action. But any experienced journalist knows that the club is obviously keeping his true status to themselves and it’s going to be quite a while until he gets back to playing 100%.

Will Atzily be in the squad on Monday in Beer Sheva? Maybe, maybe not. Would Itzhaki like to have him available? Of course as he’s been clearly the missing ingredient over the past number of games that saw mediocre results at best. His creativity is missing as is being a consistent threat from anywhere on the field of play.

Itzhaki was disappointed and apologized to the fans who showed up and filled Teddy Stadium yet again for what seemed to be the umpteenth time this season. The former striker knew full well that he, along with his team came, up very short for the supporters and sent over 25K Beitar loyalists home shaking their heads in distraught.

Beitar will need to go back to the basics and find a way to fill the void that Atzily has left should he not be available to play. Itzhaki and the staff will need to work on the mental aspects of the loss but not just that; they need to kick some butt in order for what occurred against Bnei Yehuda doesn’t happen again.

When they will watch the film of the game, they’ll see some of the lazy defensive play in action especially on the first goal (where Mendy leisurely waltzed down the field without a worry in the world) as well as some of the other lackadaisical movement all across the pitch.

Sure when Boris Enow, Timoti Muzie and Yarden Cohen entered the match at halftime, Beitar looked much, much better as Johnbosco Kalu finally broke a lengthy goal drought. But once Silva made his foolish faux pas, that was it, Beitar down to ten men was the death knell. It’s not that Yehonatan Ozer is not able to play, he definitely can and has performed well this season, but he will now have to be between the pipes against Beer Sheva at Turner Stadium and that can be intimidating to say the keeper for any keeper.

Itzhaki faced the fire and rightfully so because any which way you slice it, this was a massive sized failure, to lose a cup game, at home in front of a full stadium to a team in 10th place in the Leumit League. If Beitar is a serious club, that can never happen.

Yes, we’ve all seen upsets in our lifetimes and clubs like Maccabi Tel Aviv have lost their fair share of cup matches that they shouldn’t have. But Beitar who are trying to prove that they are part of the upper echelon of Israeli football can’t afford to make the mistakes that they did. They still have plenty of work to do and a tradition to build in order to be a championship contender year in and year out. That in itself will take some time to do as Rome or Jerusalem in this case isn’t going to be built in a day.

Itzhaki and Beitar will learn their lessons from this unnecessary defeat and the yellow-and-black will come out of this better, but without a doubt this loss was a wakeup call as the bench boss said after the game.

Better that wakeup call happen now and not later because despite Beitar being eliminated from the cup, the league is there for the taking and its got to be all hands on deck should they want to truly be a championship threat.

That should be the message that Itzhaki and the rest of the Beitar brass preaches. It’s not too late yet, but time is of the essence.