Maccabi held a light practice ahead of tonight's derby and presented the new head coach, Pako Asterayan, to the press
This morning the Maccabi Tel Aviv squad held a light practice ahead of tonight's "Toto" (League) Cup derby at Bloomfield Stadium, kicking off at 8.20pm. Prior to the practice, the club held a press conference attended by sports director Jordi Cruyff and new head coach Pako Ayestaran. Cruyff opened the proceedings by saying: "I would like to thank Pako, to welcome him, to wish him the best, to thank him as I said before, especially for coming in a not so easy week, also when the situation in Israel was a little unclear. So I do want to thank him for that and wish him all the best, support him in every single way and hopefully we'll continue to have the success we've had the last two seasons".
The new head coach was asked to say a word about his future plans for the team: "The future is today. I have to try to get the best from the players today and to assess their state and which ones could be the best to arrive to the first game this evening, for the best state of the team. This is my future for the team. In this case, there doesn't exist any future if you don't work today". Ayestaran was also asked about his first impressions of the club: "My impressions are that this is a club that are really well organised, with people on the management who have a clear idea where they want to take this club, not only the team but the whole club, a management whose targets, whose objectives go beyond football. In this case I think we have a club that have a great future and this is my first impression".
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JyhyRddJdLI&feature=youtu.be
Asked about his decision to join the club despite the difficult situation in the country, the new coach said: "As I told you before, my first decision was based on football. About the situation of the country, I am from the Basque country and we are used, from the 80's, 90's, to this type of situations. In this case I knew, I had people who were living here already and they didn't have any problems, they weren't scared for their security or for their families' security. I mentioned before for me what was key was the video conference I had with Mitch, the talks with Jordi, so no, in this case I was not worried about it".
Regarding his training style, the coach responded: "First of all passion, I'm very passionate about the game. It's something I really enjoy doing. I think we are the ones who really have to say thank you every day because we do what we like. I'm really demanding with myself and of course at the same time I try to get the same from the people I'm surrounded by. And about my idea about the game, I really like proactive teams, teams that take the initiative, who are not scared of trying to associate with the ball, trying to play as much as we can in the opposition half. For me it's so important where the club want to take the team, the value of the task set into the club, and especially what I am looking for is to wake up in the morning and have the desire to come to train and when I leave the training ground to go home with the tranquility that I have taken everything from my potential. It's not possible at every club and that's why I took Maccabi because I think it's going to be good for me and I hope good for Maccabi as well".
Asked if he felt there was anything that needed to be changed, Ayestaran replied: "First, there is how to continue winning. One of the problems of winning teams is to have the desire to continue winning because if you keep that and are the best team, the best squad, you have to win. You saw what happened in the past and in Europe to Barcelona, they kept winning and winning and despite having the best squad they didn't win last year. Why? Because if you don't have the hunger, things start going backwards". And are the Maccabi players hungry? "For now they've shown me they've got the hunger, they've got the desire, they have targets not just in the short term, they have targets in the long term. I think this is the way to continue improving because when you think you have already arrived, that's when you start stepping backwards. I have the best squad I could have. As I explained it to the players yesterday, this is football and if you don't keep yourself on the edge you have no second chance in two or three days. Now it's up to them. And I also said to the players in the end it's down to each player, most of the time it's them that do the line-up. The only thing I do is look at them and say, this guy wants to play and this other guy doesn't want to play. In this case I will have to take decisions on a weekly basis".
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