Maccabi’s Head of Football Department who is set to guide the team as an interim coach said before the match: “We are looking forward for our match against Hadera. We are playing at home, and it is very important for us to create that deterrence effect, so if we want to do that we must do it at home” Itzhaki said. “Since my appointment we won 3 matches, all of them away, while at home we struggled which is something we must change. We haven’t lost, but we didn’t win either and against every opponent especially at home we must turn our home into a fortress. We must first and foremost play good football and return to winning ways. This should begin as of tomorrow”.
On Hadera that experienced a good start to the season and are currently level with Maccabi on 18 pointsת Itzhaki added: “Hadera are a side that always makes your life difficult. We need to be prepared to the best of our ability in order to win the 3 points. You win points for playing well, and we must play good football and win”.
Itzhaki, who rested a host of players in Thursday’s Conference League match against Alashkert, explained: “I needed to rest some players and share the load as we experienced a tight fixture list over the past few weeks and we have a very packed schedule ahead of us. I wanted to share the load, gave players who didn’t have too much playing time in the league get a chance because we will need all the players until the end. We built a wide squad, there is competition for places in the starting line-up as well as competitions for those who will sit on the bench. Our aim is for players to prove themselves so they can show they deserve a place in the squad or on the bench”.
On the desire to create a successive run of matches, Itzhaki, who knows that a victory will take Maccabi above Hapoel Haifa and level with Sachnin at third place, added: “In the league we are on the back of a very tough match at Teddy that we managed to win and I think the better team on the night won, but it was still tough. In order to progress, and stick with the leading pack we must create a run of successive victories and our aim is to do it already tomorrow”.
