19 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Beitar Jerusalem lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Beitar Jerusalem they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
“Some mornings you wake up and you are still a long way from everything you know.” It is not the football and it never was; Beitar Jerusalem are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Anrie Chase was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gil Cohen is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Clubs make promises constantly and the page usually only hears about them when they are broken. This one was honoured, and the dressing room noticed that faster than any supporter did.
The words a physio says slowly. 58 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Anrie Chase and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Pedrinho was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout25 Jan 2027
The manager has not finished forgetting Anrie Chase's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
It needed Yarden Shua to find the net to bring anything home at all: 1‑1 against Hapoel Beer Sheva, and half the dressing room will call it a point won.
“A point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Uri Refaelov after the 1‑1 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
65 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Beitar Jerusalem lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Beitar Jerusalem can pretend not to have heard.
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 3 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
Beitar Jerusalem asked and Hapoel Beer Sheva said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Hapoel Tel Aviv left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Squad18 Jan 2027
Gil Cohen falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
The dugout18 Jan 2027
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 0‑1 defeat, delivered by Uri Refaelov to a room that had heard them before.
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Yarden Shua is on it.
The words a physio says slowly. 72 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Hapoel Acre waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Beitar Jerusalem is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
Beitar Jerusalem had done everything except persuade the man himself. He stays at Kairat, and the manager goes back to the drawing board with the money still in the bank.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Beitar Jerusalem this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Beitar Jerusalem asked and Hapoel Tel Aviv said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Maccabi Netanya left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Squad11 Jan 2027
Gil Cohen falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑1, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
80 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Beitar Jerusalem lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Beitar Jerusalem can pretend not to have heard.
The kind of year that ends with a name being read out in a hall. Beitar Jerusalem had the benefit of it every week and now have the problem of everybody else knowing.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Gimnasia La Plata have kept their man, and Beitar Jerusalem go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Yehonatan Ozer was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Beitar Jerusalem have made the call to Maccabi Tel Aviv. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
87 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Beitar Jerusalem lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Beitar Jerusalem this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
9 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
Maccabi Tel Aviv next, and the two sides the division is watching meet each other. Whoever wins will be told nothing is decided in the same breath as being congratulated.
Squad28 Dec 2026
Gil Cohen falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
A mark of 7.74, and nobody in the ground would argue with it. He was involved in everything that mattered and most of what did not.
The dugout28 Dec 2026
The view from the dugout
“We controlled it. There were spells I did not like and we will look at them, but the group showed me something.” Uri Refaelov, on a 1‑0 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
In brief
The dugoutAnrie Chase has become a man the manager trusts
The words a physio says slowly. 95 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.23 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Beitar Jerusalem can pretend not to have heard.
A performance of 8.29 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
Squad21 Dec 2026
Gil Cohen falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Johnbosco Samuel Kalu and Beitar Jerusalem agree another 4 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.