Rade Prica: “This Win was Complete Madness”

Maccabi's Swedish striker Rade Prica, whose injury time goal paved the way to Monday night's dramatic 3-2 win over Bnei Yehuda, is at no loss for words: "This is the kind of match you won't ever forget".

No one could possibly have guessed the outcome of Maccabi Tel Aviv's Monday night match against Bnei Yehuda beforehand, let alone in the 89^th minute when an Oz Rali goal gave Bnei Yehuda a 2-1 lead.  Not even the 8,000 disappointed Maccabi Tel Aviv fans, who seemed resigned to their club's fate, could have imagined the drama, and the joy, that awaited them. Then in the 93^rd minute came Rade Prica's equaliser, his second goal on the night and third since joining the Yellows in January, and the fans came alive once again. But six minutes later, in literally the dying moment of the match, came the real explosion, when Moshe Lugassi's spectacular strike set the terraces alight and won the match for Maccabi. "It was an important goal," Lugassi said modestly after the match. "It was an important victory and I'm very glad it finished that way."

Lugassi added his own perspective on the goal that is already being called by some the "championship goal": "When I saw (Sheran) Yeini with the ball I shouted to him to pass it to me. Everyone else was marked so I gave it my best shot. To win this match, after trailing at that point in the game, that tells you a lot about the club, that we don't give up until the very end."  

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5GlpYCI94ow

Head coach Oscar Garcia was obviously very pleased with the goal and also talked about the determination of his players at the end: "This was only a goal to win two points because we already had one, but it was a fantastic goal from Moshiko (Lugassi). I'm proud of all the players because they kept pressing forward and looking for goals till the very end of the match and I think it was this positive mentality that gave us the match."

Striker Rade Prica, whose brace preceded Lugassi's dramatic match winner and has now captured the hearts of Maccabi Tel Aviv fans for a second consecutive week, was very emotional at the end: "It's too early to say this was our championship match, but for the club's mind set this was surely one of the sweetest and most important wins of all. There was this feeling that the match was over, and I got this long ball close to goal and all I could think was kick it in. Any time you concede a goal it's hard to take, but you never stop believing. And when I scored I thought to myself, blimey, we can win this one. This was complete madness, this one. This is a match they'll be talking about for years to come."

Despite the euphoria over this famous victory, however, the club will have to face a disciplinary hearing for a bottle that a spectator in the Maccabi terraces threw on the pitch in the 74^th minute.