Hapoel Tel Aviv in Lala-land!
Sorry, couldn’t resist that one.
It’s been a fairly bleak couple of weeks on the Israeli football scene, what with the national team throwing away any chance of qualifying for next year’s World Cup and Maccabi Haifa getting stuffed by Bayern Munich in the Champions League.
But tonight, Hapoel Tel Aviv played Celtic in their first round of Europa League matches. And pulled off a nice little result that’ll keep their chances alive of progressing to the next round. The Scots went ahead after 25 minutes, but hats off to Tel Aviv, they fought back to equalize and then claimed a late, late winner through Maaran Lala.
OK, Celtic aren’t the force they were a couple of years back, but still carry with them a big European reputation. And with the Celtic management putting the blame on the Tel Aviv heat, Celtic fans have already voiced their thoughts on the match on football forums, including this disgruntled fan on the BBC:
I cannot believe that one of the poorest teams I have ever seen at this level only had to put in a half decent 45 minutes to put us away…
About the Author: Ashley intended staying in Israel for a couple of months...18 years later, married to a local girl with 2 littluns (er, now 3), he decided to set up 
