53 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Hapoel Tel Aviv 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 Hapoel Tel Aviv can pretend not to have heard.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Fernand Mayembo was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Hapoel Tel Aviv this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
A month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Ziv Morgan is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
“It is not the end of the world and it is not good enough. Both of those are true.” The manager, after a 0‑0 draw, said the honest thing and then went to say it again inside.
In brief
The dugoutZiv Morgan has become a man the manager trusts
60 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Hapoel Tel Aviv lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Hapoel Tel Aviv have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
“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; Hapoel Tel Aviv are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Fernand Mayembo was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Marked 6.71 on 12 actions at both ends of the pitch. Midfielders like this get described as unspectacular by people who have never tried to play against one.
Minute 91, against Maccabi Tel Aviv, and a goal that felt like a win to everybody who had stayed. It was a draw. Nobody leaving the ground will describe it as one.
The words a physio says slowly. 67 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Daniel Dappa 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.
A defender's mistake gets tidied up by somebody else; a goalkeeper's ends up in the net. He knew before the ball crossed the line, and so did everybody in the ground.
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
He is the name in every column and on every phone-in, which is a heavy thing to carry at any age. Some footballers thrive on it; others are quietly finished by it.
90 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Hapoel Tel Aviv lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Hapoel Tel Aviv have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Squad4 Oct 2027
Daniel Dappa 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 month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Marcus Coco is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
“It is not the end of the world and it is not good enough. Both of those are true.” The manager, after a 0‑0 draw, said the honest thing and then went to say it again inside.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
97 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Hapoel Tel Aviv lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
3 goals in one afternoon from one man. The other players were also present, a witness confirmed.
Player ratings27 Sep 2027
Alfredo Martínez, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 8.39
A mark of 8.39 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Centre-halves are allowed forward twice a season and are judged on what they do when they get there. Ziv Morgan scored, was marked 7.86, and got back before anybody noticed he had gone.
He is 22 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Daniel Dappa. 2‑0 against Hapoel Haifa, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Player ratings27 Sep 2027
Marcus Coco was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.40. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
104 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Hapoel Tel Aviv lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 20 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Hapoel Tel Aviv have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Player ratings20 Sep 2027
Up for the corner, and Marcus Coco delivers — 7.93
Centre-halves are allowed forward twice a season and are judged on what they do when they get there. Marcus Coco scored, was marked 7.93, and got back before anybody noticed he had gone.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Hapoel Tel Aviv is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
The shirt still fits. Neoray Ozana is back at Hapoel Tel Aviv, and half the ground remembers him in these colours already. Some signings need selling to the town; this one sold itself.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Daniel Dappa 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.
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Boardroom6 Sep 2027
Hapoel Tel Aviv close the window on a squad of their own making
15 in and 27 out, and no more changes for months. The manager has what he has, the supporters have their opinion of it, and the table will have the last word.
Everything was agreed until it was not, and Ziv Morgan reports back to Hapoel Tel Aviv with a summer to forget. Neither club is saying who walked away from the table.
A deal that was a phone call from completion at lunchtime was dead by midnight. Hapoel Tel Aviv will try again when the window opens; Oxford United may not be selling by then.
The system has changed and his position has not. A footballer can improve his form; he cannot improve the manager’s formation, and that is the whole of the problem.
The demotion a club never announces and a dressing room always notices. Emiliano Cuvertino is further from the side than he was, and the reason will not be given until he asks.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Hapoel Tel Aviv, and 1 appearances in 6 say he has earned the hearing.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Hapoel Tel Aviv, and both men came out saying it was fine.
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Hapoel Tel Aviv, and it is not being withdrawn.
The bid was some way short and Hapoel Tel Aviv did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Player ratings30 Aug 2027
A brace, and Andrian Kraev takes the afternoon — 8.38
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Andrian Kraev provided it, and the 8.38 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
$4.6M on the table at Oxford United. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
The fee is $640.0K, the contract is signed, and the argument about whether he is worth it can begin. Maccabi Haifa drove a hard bargain; time will say who won it.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Tazabo Malesa is 19, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
The morning the pathway stops being a brochure and becomes a team sheet. Most of them will not be here in three years; all of them have already done the hard part, which was getting to today.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Daniel Dappa 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.
The offer went to Slovan Bratislava this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Gareji Sagarejo have kept their man, and Hapoel Tel Aviv go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Daniel Dappa trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Hapoel Tel Aviv know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Nobody at Hapoel Tel Aviv will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
Numbers do not stay secret in a dressing room. He is not asking for more than he is worth; he is asking why somebody beside him is worth more, and Hapoel Tel Aviv have no good answer.
The offer from Getafe for Daniel Dappa was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Hapoel Tel Aviv, and it is not being withdrawn.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Hapoel Tel Aviv is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Hapoel Tel Aviv have done the hard part with Juventude, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
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.
Something was said to Andrian Kraev and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
Dor Benyamini 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.
Qualification is done, and next season the floodlights come on for something bigger. A stage for the players, oxygen for the accounts and a passport for everybody else.
Maccabi Haifa go through and Hapoel Tel Aviv go home, 2‑3 the scoreline that did it. The dressing room will call the league the priority now, because that is what dressing rooms say.
Not a month, not a run of form — a whole season of being the best 19-year-old anybody in this division could put on a pitch. This is the honour that gets mentioned for the rest of his career.
An individual honour is a strange thing in a team game, and the best of them are never argued with. He has had the sort of year that ends with his name being read out, and Hapoel Tel Aviv have had the benefit of it.
Player ratings24 May 2027
Daniel Dappa, 19, plays like he has been here for years — 7.76
A mark of 7.76 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 19-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Successful dribbles: 20. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Or Israelov will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Hapoel Tel Aviv the goodbyes have quietly begun.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Hapoel Tel Aviv know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
A conversation in the manager’s office, and a commitment that came out of it. Promises like that are cheap to make and expensive to break, and Tal Archel has written the date down.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Hapoel Tel Aviv this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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 Doron Leidner is on it.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Marcus Coco signs something — a contract at Hapoel Tel Aviv or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Position 4, 50 points, and a run-in that decides whether next season has Thursday nights in it. Nobody is calling it a race yet, which is what people say during one.
“I respect the manager and I am not going to sit here and pretend I am happy.” It is the most common sentence in football and it has never once been the end of a story.
Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Hapoel Tel Aviv. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.
A few words of the language, a friend at the next peg, and a training ground that has stopped feeling foreign. Nothing measurable, and everything visible on Saturdays.
In brief
SquadAssaf Tzur is training like a man with a point to make
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 Doron Leidner is on it.
Position 4, 50 points, and a run-in that decides whether next season has Thursday nights in it. Nobody is calling it a race yet, which is what people say during one.
“I have done everything asked of me in training and it has not changed a thing on a Saturday.” The most familiar complaint in football, and one Hapoel Tel Aviv will have to answer with minutes or with a transfer.
A conversation in the manager’s office, and a commitment that came out of it. Promises like that are cheap to make and expensive to break, and Liel has written the date down.
He looks like a man who lives here now rather than one who is working here. It took most of a season, and at Hapoel Tel Aviv the difference is visible from the back of the stand.
The word out of the training ground is that he has been the sharpest man there all week. It is the quietest story a paper carries and it usually runs the week before somebody's run in the side begins.
The last league game has been played and the table has stopped moving: 50 points. The summer begins on Monday, and so does the argument about what it all meant.
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Hapoel Tel Aviv can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
Tal Archel 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.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Daniel Dappa trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
“A point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Itay Benayoun after the 0‑0 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
The crowd waited for a goal that never came. Hapoel Raanana defended in numbers and left with what they came for, and the two sides could be playing still without troubling a scorer.
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Hapoel Tel Aviv know it.
Marked 8.37 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Something was said to Andrian Kraev and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
“The players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 2‑0, Itay Benayoun could afford to be generous.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Hapoel Tel Aviv they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
1 for Andrian Kraev, marked 7.99, and a centre-half's name in the part of the report he normally only reaches by mistake. He will not be allowed to forget it in the dressing room for a month.
A defender on the scoresheet, which happens rarely enough that everybody in the ground remembers who took the corner. 1 for him, and a mark of 7.71 for the rest of it.
Successful dribbles: 25. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
A player who expected to start watched it instead. The manager will call it a decision for the team; Xande Silva will call it something else in private.
“I did not go to Hapoel Raanana to sit and watch. I want to come back to Hapoel Tel Aviv and fight for my place.” 0 appearances in 27 matches say the rest.
“The players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 2‑0, Itay Benayoun could afford to be generous.
Successful dribbles: 19. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
Shahar Piven and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
The dugout15 Feb 2027
The manager’s verdict
“That is on me. I pick the team and I picked wrong.” Managers say that when they mean it and when they need to be seen to, and after 0‑1 Itay Benayoun left the room before anybody could ask which.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Bnei Yehuda in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
A year in and the city has not opened up, the language has not come, and lunch is eaten alone more often than anybody at Hapoel Tel Aviv would admit. It shows on Saturdays.
A brace, and Andrian Kraev takes the afternoon — 8.58
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Andrian Kraev provided it, and the 8.58 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Hapoel Tel Aviv can pretend not to have heard.
Player ratings18 Jan 2027
Daniel Dappa, 19, plays like he has been here for years — 7.64
A mark of 7.64 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 19-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
The deal with Hapoel Beer Sheva is done in every sense but the one that puts him on the pitch. Nothing goes wrong at this stage, except on the occasions when it does.
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Unión de Santa Fe keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 6 goals between Hapoel Tel Aviv and Beitar Jerusalem, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.
A 4‑2 win over Beitar Jerusalem, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
At 22 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Hapoel Tel Aviv can pretend not to have heard.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Hapoel Tel Aviv have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 22 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
Hapoel Kiryat Shmona pay $870.0K, and the deal is done. The number reads well on a balance sheet; whether it reads well on the pitch is next season's question.
The name of Roei Alkukin has come up in conversations Hapoel Tel Aviv were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
At 22 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
Two goals and a mark of 9.06 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
5 wins on the spin now, and the question has changed from whether the run ends to who ends it. Confidence like this cannot be bought; it has to be earned exactly this way.
Player ratings28 Dec 2026
Daniel Dappa, 19, plays like he has been here for years — 7.84
A mark of 7.84 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 19-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
At 19 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
Marcus Coco 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. Régis N'do 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.
3 wins on the spin now, and the question has changed from whether the run ends to who ends it. Confidence like this cannot be bought; it has to be earned exactly this way.
Player ratings14 Dec 2026
Anas Mahamid was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.68. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Mor Buskila commits to Hapoel Tel Aviv for another 4 years.
Player ratings14 Dec 2026
Andrian Kraev was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.03. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
Goalkeepers do not get to make mistakes; they get to make goals. He made one, he knew it instantly, and there was nobody behind him to make it anything else.
At 19 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Régis N'do was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“The players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 4‑0, Itay Benayoun could afford to be generous.
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Hapoel Tel Aviv know it.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Régis N'do 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.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Hapoel Tel Aviv, and 0 appearances in 15 say he has earned the hearing.
“The players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 2‑0, Itay Benayoun could afford to be generous.
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Hapoel Beer Sheva in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
Something was said to Stav Toriel and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
“I watch every Hapoel Tel Aviv game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Hapoel Raanana runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
The captaincy has been taken off Andrian Kraev. Hapoel Tel Aviv will call it a decision about the team; a dressing room reads it as a verdict on a man.
The dugout2 Nov 2026
The view from the dugout
“We did not lose. Some weeks that is all you get, and I would rather have the point than not.” Itay Benayoun chose the glass-half-full version of 0‑0; the supporters left with the other one.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Hapoel Tel Aviv can pretend not to have heard.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Hapoel Tel Aviv have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Régis N'do was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
4 matches without defeat, and then Bnei Sakhnin. Nobody at the ground pretended it would go on forever; nobody expected it to stop here either.
The dugout26 Oct 2026
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 1‑3 defeat, delivered by Itay Benayoun to a room that had heard them before.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Stav Toriel. 1‑0 against Hapoel Kiryat Shmona, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Successful dribbles: 18. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad19 Oct 2026
Régis N'do 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.
7 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Hapoel Tel Aviv, and 3 appearances in 9 say he has earned the hearing.
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Hapoel Tel Aviv know it.
“I did not go to Hapoel Raanana to sit and watch. I want to come back to Hapoel Tel Aviv and fight for my place.” 0 appearances in 7 matches say the rest.
He is 19 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.
Régis N'do 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.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 18 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Régis N'do 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.
“A point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Itay Benayoun after the 1‑1 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
Daniel Dappa is 18, and for one weekend he was the best of everybody his age in the division. Nobody should build a career on it and everybody quietly does.
9 shots, and a count that reads like a good afternoon until you check the other column. Strikers survive weeks like this on the understanding that the chances keep arriving; the day they stop is the day it becomes a problem.
Maccabi Haifa next, and one man in the Hapoel Tel Aviv dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
Omri Levi 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.
Maccabi Haifa have been asked whether they would lend him. Loans are agreed quickly or not at all, and this one will be one or the other by the weekend.
Numbers do not stay secret in a dressing room and never have. He is not asking for more than he is worth; he is asking why somebody beside him is worth more, and at Hapoel Tel Aviv that is a harder question to answer.
He trains hard, says the right things and goes home to an empty flat. Nobody at Hapoel Tel Aviv has done anything wrong, which is exactly what makes it so difficult to fix.
A new face in his position, and Emmanuel Boateng suddenly has to win back what he thought he owned. Hapoel Tel Aviv have promised nothing — clubs rarely do at this stage.