Nobody upstairs has said anything, which is the loudest thing they could do. Results buy silence in this game; the account at Hapoel Kfar Saba is running low.
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 Kfar Saba this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Konadu Yiadom was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
“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 Kfar Saba can pretend not to have heard.
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 Kfar Saba this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The medical room confirms 30 days on the sidelines for Konadu Yiadom, and a plan built around him now has to be rebuilt.
Squad22 Mar 2027
Konadu Yiadom 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.
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Hapoel Kfar Saba can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Niv Tubul trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
“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 The request is on a desk at Hapoel Kfar Saba, and it is not being withdrawn.
Denny Gropper 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 thought about how hard another man trains, and Noam Cohen was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout15 Mar 2027
Nevot Ratner is still being punished for one mistake
Nobody will confirm it and the team sheets confirm it every week. One error has bought him a spell as second choice that is already longer than the error deserved.
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Hapoel Kfar Saba are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
The board’s statement ran to three sentences and one of them mentioned results. Ofir Peretz has managed long enough to translate: win soon, or the next statement is shorter.
“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 Kfar Saba, and it is not being withdrawn.
Everything agreed with another club, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
Denny Gropper 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.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Dor Peretz has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Eden Hemed has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
In brief
SquadKonadu Yiadom falls out with a teammate over standards
“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 Kfar Saba, and it is not being withdrawn.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Hapoel Kfar Saba 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 Kfar Saba 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 Konadu Yiadom was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
A change in the dugout is not one story, it is twenty-five of them. This is Nahuel Pezzini's: he was somebody's player, and now he has to be somebody else's, starting from nothing.
A bad atmosphere can be waited out. A group of people meeting afterwards to decide what to do about it cannot, and everybody in the building knows which stage this is.
Successful dribbles: 33. 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.
Position 12 on 14 points. Every season is a story and this is the last line of it, and now the club has three months to decide what the next one is about.
“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 Kfar Saba 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 Kfar Saba have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
4 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
4 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Hapoel Kfar Saba can tell you which week it ends in.
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 Kfar Saba this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“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 Kfar Saba, and it is not being withdrawn.
3 games without scoring. Strikers stop looking up, midfielders take the extra touch, and every shot that clears the bar is followed by a groan that has been building since the last goal.
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 Kfar Saba this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Konadu Yiadom was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Júlio César, and the manager let it.
The dugout15 Feb 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 0‑2 defeat, delivered by Ofir Peretz to a room that had heard them before.
The dugout15 Feb 2027
Nevot Ratner is still being punished for one mistake
Nobody will confirm it and the team sheets confirm it every week. One error has bought him a spell as second choice that is already longer than the error deserved.
In brief
Player ratingsNevot Ratner could not find anything
What was said behind closed doors has now been said in front of a microphone. Everybody at Hapoel Kfar Saba can do the arithmetic, including the man it is aimed at.
Nevot Ratner 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.
Hapoel Kfar Saba asked and Santa Cruz said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Konadu Yiadom 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 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 Kfar Saba will have to answer with minutes or with a transfer.
Nobody upstairs has said anything, which is the loudest thing they could do. Results buy silence in this game; the account at Hapoel Kfar Saba is running low.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Hapoel Kfar Saba have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Boardroom1 Feb 2027
Deadline passes with 5 signed and 0 gone
That is the business done at Hapoel Kfar Saba until the window opens again. Whether it was enough will be answered on Saturdays rather than in a column, and the first Saturday is close.
The deal with Maccabi Netanya 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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Beitar Jerusalem have kept their man, and Hapoel Kfar Saba go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Tsubasa Nishizawa has just signed for Hapoel Kfar Saba, and for once the answer mattered.
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.
A bad atmosphere can be waited out. A group of people meeting afterwards to decide what to do about it cannot, and everybody in the building knows which stage this is.
$610.0K on the table at Beitar Jerusalem. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
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 Kfar Saba this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Victor Ntokon has, at Hapoel Kfar Saba, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Maccabi Tel Aviv have kept their man, and Hapoel Kfar Saba go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 20-year-old it feels ownership of. Gilbert Bandama has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
22 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
13 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Hapoel Kfar Saba can tell you which week it ends in.
The deal with Maccabi Tel Aviv 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.
Denny Gropper 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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Bnei Sakhnin have kept their man, and Hapoel Kfar Saba go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Noam 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.
Hapoel Beer Sheva 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.
He found out with everybody else, an hour before kick-off, from a sheet of paper on a wall. Nobody at Hapoel Kfar Saba pretended it was anything other than a decision about him.
21 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Hapoel Kfar Saba has to find a result from somewhere.
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 12 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
Position 12 and 8 points, and the table gets read bottom-up in this part of town. The calendar has stopped being a schedule and started being a countdown.
Denny Gropper 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.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Gilbert Bandama and Hapoel Kfar Saba agree another 5 years.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Maccabi Tel Aviv have kept their man, and Hapoel Kfar Saba go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Guy Refaelov is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
20 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
11 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Hapoel Kfar Saba can tell you which week it ends in.
What was said behind closed doors has now been said in front of a microphone. Everybody at Hapoel Kfar Saba can do the arithmetic, including the man it is aimed at.
Nobody upstairs has said anything, which is the loudest thing they could do. Results buy silence in this game; the account at Hapoel Kfar Saba is running low.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 21 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.
A bad atmosphere can be waited out. A group of people meeting afterwards to decide what to do about it cannot, and everybody in the building knows which stage this is.
10 games without scoring. Strikers stop looking up, midfielders take the extra touch, and every shot that clears the bar is followed by a groan that has been building since the last goal.
“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 Kfar Saba know it.
0‑1 to Bnei Yehuda, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
The dugout28 Dec 2026
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 Ofir Peretz left the room before anybody could ask which.
Squad28 Dec 2026
Noam 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 chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 9 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Denis Parkinson has, at Hapoel Kfar Saba, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
He is 20 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.
Gitai Sofir 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. Noam 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.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Denis Parkinson and Hapoel Kfar Saba agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
17 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
8 games without scoring. Strikers stop looking up, midfielders take the extra touch, and every shot that clears the bar is followed by a groan that has been building since the last goal.
Denny Gropper 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.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Dan Glazer is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
“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.
16 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
7 games without scoring. Strikers stop looking up, midfielders take the extra touch, and every shot that clears the bar is followed by a groan that has been building since the last goal.
“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 Kfar Saba can pretend not to have heard.
Both clubs in the mire, one fixture between them, and a ground that will be louder and more frightened than at any point in the season. Hapoel Kfar Saba know what is at stake and so does everybody in the away end.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Noam 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.
There is a figure at which a wage bill stops being ambitious and becomes the reason nothing else is possible, and this club has reached it. Nothing is left over for a transfer, a stand or a rainy afternoon.
A month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Gilbert Bandama is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
15 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 6 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
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 Kfar Saba this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Successful dribbles: 18. 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.
The dugout30 Nov 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 0‑2 defeat, delivered by Ofir Peretz to a room that had heard them before.
Squad30 Nov 2026
Noam 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.
14 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Hapoel Kfar Saba has to find a result from somewhere.
0‑3 to Maccabi Netanya, and it was every bit as bad as the number suggests. There are defeats you argue about and defeats you apologise for; this was the second kind.
5 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Hapoel Kfar Saba can tell you which week it ends in.
Denny Gropper 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.
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.
The door stayed shut a long time after the final whistle. What was said in there is between them; whether it worked is between them and Saturday.
The dugout23 Nov 2026
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 0‑3 Ofir Peretz left the room before anybody could ask which.
13 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 4 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
Denny Gropper 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 had been thinking. Noam 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.
The dugout16 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.” Ofir Peretz chose the glass-half-full version of 0‑0; the supporters left with the other one.
The team sheet says it in public every week until it changes. The only version of being dropped a footballer cannot argue with, and the one he takes hardest.
Ninety minutes, no goals, and the argument started before the car park emptied: a point gained, or two thrown away against Maccabi Tel Aviv? Both sides of it will still be going on Thursday.
Maccabi Netanya next, and one man in the Hapoel Kfar Saba dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
12 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Hapoel Kfar Saba has to find a result from somewhere.
“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 Kfar Saba can pretend not to have heard.
3 games without scoring. Strikers stop looking up, midfielders take the extra touch, and every shot that clears the bar is followed by a groan that has been building since the last goal.
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 Kfar Saba this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Noam 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.
“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.
The team at the top of the table next, and the honest measure of where this side actually is. Anybody can beat the club below them; the question is what happens against Maccabi Tel Aviv.
11 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Hapoel Kfar Saba has to find a result from somewhere.
It has stopped being a mood in the stands and started being something organised. Boards can ignore a bad atmosphere for a long time; they cannot ignore this stage of it for very long at all.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 6 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
“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 Kfar Saba know it.
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 Kfar Saba this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Denny Gropper 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.
16 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.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Ofir Peretz after 0‑1, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Noam Cohen was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
There is no complaint available here and everybody involved knows it, which does not make the walk to the bench any shorter. Form is the only currency in football that cannot be borrowed against.
9 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Hapoel Kfar Saba has to find a result from somewhere.
Position 14 and 3 points, and the table gets read bottom-up in this part of town. The calendar has stopped being a schedule and started being a countdown.
7.38, 1 on the scoresheet, and the specific comedy of a back-four player celebrating like somebody who does this every week. He does not, and that is exactly why the ground reacted the way it did.
Yoav Koren 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.
Minute 87, against Hapoel Haifa, 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.
It needed Gitai Sofir to find the net to bring anything home at all: 1‑1 against Hapoel Haifa, and half the dressing room will call it a point won.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
The manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Ofir Peretz was not hiding it after 1‑1, and nobody in the Hapoel Kfar Saba dressing room was either.
In brief
SquadNoam Cohen falls out with a teammate over standards
8 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
“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 Kfar Saba can pretend not to have heard.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 19 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.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Eli Shechter has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Omer Melikson has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
Something was said to Denny Gropper and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
7 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
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 Kfar Saba this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Successful dribbles: 19. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Almog Elshtein has improved at 24, which nobody expected
Careers are supposed to plateau and then decline, and the players who ignore that are always the ones who were listening on the training ground. 3 points of it, over months, at an age where the direction normally only goes one way.
The dugout5 Oct 2026
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 1‑2 Ofir Peretz left the room before anybody could ask which.
Every club in football pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time somebody has tried it.
A month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Gilbert Bandama is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
Out, 0‑3 to Hapoel Tel Aviv, and the long argument about which of the small moments decided it. The league is all there is now, and everybody knows it.
It finished 0-3. A cup exit is a disappointment; this was a public dismantling, and the difference between the two is the number of people who will still be talking about it in August.
6 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
Denny Gropper 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.
The manager kept them in and said what needed saying. A response is expected on Saturday, and if it does not come the questions move upstairs.
Squad28 Sep 2026
16 new faces, and Hapoel Kfar Saba are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
Up for the corner, and Gitai Sofir delivers — 7.64
Centre-halves are allowed forward twice a season and are judged on what they do when they get there. Gitai Sofir scored, was marked 7.64, and got back before anybody noticed he had gone.
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.
Yoav Koren 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.
“There are things I liked and things we will be doing on Tuesday until they are right.” 1‑1, and a manager who had already decided what Tuesday looked like.
In brief
SquadGilbert Bandama, 20, is the weekend’s best young player
3 games without scoring. Strikers stop looking up, midfielders take the extra touch, and every shot that clears the bar is followed by a groan that has been building since the last goal.
At 20 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.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Shon Melikson has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
“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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Noam Cohen was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
In brief
The dugoutThe manager makes an example of Tom Shelah
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 16 arrived, 1 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
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 Kfar Saba this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The demotion a club never announces and a dressing room always notices. Konadu Yiadom is further from the side than he was, and the reason will not be given until he asks.
The dugout7 Sep 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 0‑3 defeat, delivered by Ofir Peretz to a room that had heard them before.
Successful dribbles: 14. 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.
In brief
SquadWords at Hapoel Kfar Saba training over how hard people work
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Nahuel Pezzini is living that version at Hapoel Kfar Saba, and it tends to show in the first month.
Hapoel Kfar Saba asked and Flamengo said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Yoav Koren 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.
0‑2 to Hapoel Tel Aviv, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
Squad31 Aug 2026
16 new faces, and Hapoel Kfar Saba are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
Arsenal have accepted the money. What Hapoel Kfar Saba do not yet have is the man, and between here and the photograph is a conversation about wages that both sides are dreading.
Hapoel Kfar Saba asked and Santos said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Yoav Koren 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.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Noam 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 plan went upstairs and came back down. Nothing about that will make a headline anywhere else, and everybody who works at the training ground will remember it for years.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Beitar Jerusalem have kept their man, and Hapoel Kfar Saba go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
$220.0K was the most the club would pay and Maccabi Tel Aviv were asking for more. Deals like this are revived in the last week of a window roughly half the time, and everybody involved knows it.
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 Kfar Saba this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
A loan enquiry to Vasco da Gama: cover, or a look at somebody the club cannot afford to buy yet. Either way the answer will come back inside the week.
Squad17 Aug 2026
Noam 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.
Hapoel Kfar Saba 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.
Yoav Koren 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.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Eitan Natcho is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Uri Atzili has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Uri Glazer has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Avi Shechter has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Konadu Yiadom and Hapoel Kfar Saba agree another 4 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
12 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.
Maccabi Tel Aviv 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.