Maccabi were delighted last night with the 3-0 result against Hapoel Acre. The performance was another matter. Einbinder: "We'll have to learn from this and improve"
Last night, after Maccabi Tel Aviv's 3-0 win against Hapoel Acre, head coach Pako Ayesteran was asked if it felt good to get a penalty with less than a minute on the matchclock: "Yes, and we were 3-0 winners after 30 minutes. That's probably the reason why we were a little bit confused and we started doing things that we normally don't do. I said to the players that I don't think we should be pleased about the game we played today, because I think we have to be honest with ourselves. It was a game we should have enjoyed in the second half but we slowed down the game too much, we were not aggressive enough in the last third and I think it was a game we could have finished with a higher score".
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uc3dukixtUk
Pako also had a word to say about the opposing side: "To be honest it was a team that tried to go forward. It wasn't a typical team that came to Bloomfield to drop back in defence with the lines together. And that's the reason I expected it to be easier for us but as I said before in the first half we were not vertical enough in the middle of the park and we played the ball so slow. In the second half we sorted that out because (Nikola) Mitrovic was connecting more vertically with (Mahran) Radi and getting the ball in the right position. But after we did nothing in the last third".
Dan Einbinder, making his first league start since returning from injury, had this to say after the match: "We opened the match in top gear and there haven't been that many matches this season that we've put to bed in the first minutes, I think it took us around 30 minutes to build up a 3-0 advantage. But the result could have been much higher, we could have been more aggressive in the last third. We'll have to have a look at that, improve that bit and put it into practice in our upcoming games".
As for being back in the first eleven, the midfielder reacted: "I was very happy, excited even, being in the eleven today because it's my first league start this year. You see, there's a reward for hard work and not giving up. It hasn't been easy for me because I've been out of the squad for a lot of games and haven't played much. But I've tried to impress the coach at every practice and when my number came up for the State Cup tie last week I hope I gave him a good reason to let me play. I have to keep working hard to impress him, and I hope I succeed because he's the coach and he decides and we have to respect that".
