Jordi Cruyff, the Yellow & Blue Head Coach looked back on his squad’s 1:0 loss to Hapoel Raanana on Matchday 23 of the Israel Premier League Ligat Ha’Al:
“The first half we were very sloppy and were late all of the time. Every rebound and second ball was for them, even the goal was defended poorly off a rebound in our area. We played badly. The second half we pushed more, we didn’t create a lot of clear chances but we had chances at the end with crosses, corners or free kicks. It’s one of those days that despite not playing well we still had chances to score but the ball didn’t go in.”
About Raanana and more on the match:
“They played well in the first half and in football when every first or second ball is for you, you have a big advantage. They were also dangerous on the counter attack. In the second half we put a lot of pressure to try to score a goal. We had maybe 20 shots today which is usually good enough to score one or two goals, but today the feeling was that the ball just wasn’t going to go in no matter who had the ball or the chance. When you don’t score and you have a poor first half you lose the game.”
Title battle:
“There are four teams that are close together and every week there is a team losing points. We lost points in a place that we didn’t expect to and on a day that we didn’t expect to. It happened, but now we have to stand up strong and understand that to win games we have to play from the first to the last moment we have to go 200%.”
