Eran Zahavi’s 86th minute penalty at Bloomfield secured Maccabi’s 2-1 aggregate victory over AEK Larnaca and a place in the Conference League Playoff: “There are no easy matches at this level, they made it tough for us, we created many chances but the ball simply didn’t want to go in”. Zahavi said, “I am delighted we didn’t concede today which was very important because when we keep a clean sheet then the chances that do go in could give us a narrow 1-0 victory. This is our team effort and it is important that we will be very strong, keep creating chances and score as well. Let us just hope that it will come with a bit more ease.”
Ahead of the rest of the season, the 36-year-old striker added: “There is always room for improvement as sometimes things go easier and sometimes more difficult. I like the way we advanced the hard way as we suffered a bit but this way we get to appreciate it. There are situations you must suffer for each other in order to progress and raise your standards. Our ai now is to rest today, we have another match on Sunday (Toto Cup Semi Final against Bnei Sakhnin) and we will try and be as ready as we possibly can”.
