The most important factor that can be taken away from the unconvincing 2:1 victory over Maccabi Netanya was that Maccabi Tel Aviv collected three points and go into the international break with a chance to rest up and prepare for the next phase of the season.
Midfielder Dor Peretz who assisted on Tal Ben Chaim’s goal spoke about the match and didn’t look for any excuses: “I don’t think there was any specific reason as to why we didn’t play well. There’s nothing that can justify our performance. We’re happy that we won even though the match wasn’t one of our best.”
About the last few matches:
“We may have lost in the Champions League, but we’ve won two straight league games including the Derby against Hapoel. We have to raise the level of our play a bit more as we are going through a rough stretch right now and we expect to play better than we have been.”
On the upcoming break:
“The break is coming at a good time and we’ll come back even stronger. We’re definitely tired. Playing three matches in a week is not something that Israeli players are used to and we’re not used to it as well. But I want to be clear that even though we are playing many matches we still need to be playing better than we are and having so many games shouldn’t have any effect on us.”
