The Yellow-and-Blue were unable to repeat as League champions, a title they captured in 1991/92 that allowed them to play in Champions League qualification. The campaign began by defeating Valletta in a pair of matches but ended by being eliminated by Club Brugge and finishing in second place overall in the domestic league.
Maccabi came into the derby on Matchday Seven with only 10 points after a sputtering start to their season. Just like everyone in the squad, the 1992/93 season began very discouragingly for Eli Drikes. The striker couldn’t get his hands on a place in the starting lineup as coach Avram Grant used him as an option off of the bench.
After the first seven Matchdays, Drikes hadn’t been able to score a goal, but his drought ended right in time for the Derby match to the delight of all the Maccabi fans.
Grant’s Maccabi came into a packed stadium with 23,000 fans who were able to see Drikes finally get a spot in the starting IX. In the 9th minute, the striker went high into the air to head in his first goal of the campaign and give Maccabi a 1:0 lead in the early going. Right before halftime, Drikes sent the Ramat Gan crowd into a frenzy as he received the ball from Avi “Jerusalem” Cohen, turned a Hapoel central defender inside-out and steered the ball past the Reds ‘keeper to take a 2:0 lead into the break.
But Drikes wasn’t finished just yet and in the 62nd minute he would enter into the annals of Maccabi history by completing a hat-trick after getting a long ball from Alexander Polukarov. Drikes would receive a standing ovation by the Yellow-and-Blue crowd as he was substituted right before a goal by Avi “Jerusalem” Cohen in the 84th minute. After the match, Drikes made it clear why Maccabi won the Derby: “I said it before, but when we would begin to be friends again and play as one unit in the pitch, no one would be able to stand up to us and today we proved just that.”
