1‑4 against Bnei Sakhnin, and no complaints that would survive the replay. The manager spoke about character afterwards; the terraces used shorter words.
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 now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Temperley have kept their man, and Hapoel Kiryat Shmona go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
It is not a grievance and it is not a demand: he wants to play continental football, and he has stopped hiding it. Whether Hapoel Kiryat Shmona can give him that is a question about the club, not about him.
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.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Rüfət Abdullazadə provided it, and the 8.96 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Player ratings7 Sep 2026
A brace, and Ramzi Safouri takes the afternoon — 8.17
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Ramzi Safouri provided it, and the 8.17 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 Kiryat Shmona can pretend not to have heard.
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 19 arrived, 1 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Cruzeiro is saying, and nobody at Hapoel Kiryat Shmona is enjoying the guessing.
Aviv Avraham 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.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Hapoel Kiryat Shmona have done the hard part with Bragantino, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Hapoel Kiryat Shmona asked and Maccabi Haifa said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
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.
The dugout31 Aug 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 0‑4 defeat, delivered by Adi Hemed to a room that had heard them before.
“It was not right for me. I am not going to explain why to anybody except the people I owe an explanation to.” A deal agreed between two clubs, and a player who declined to be part of it.
Nemanja Ljubisavljević 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 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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Bragantino have kept their man, and Hapoel Kiryat Shmona go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Gil Dabbur is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Yaw Ackah was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Yonatan Benayoun and Hapoel Kiryat Shmona agree another 4 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
It is the quietest way a club tells you what its ambitions are. The money was asked for, the money was refused, and the people who work there every day now know exactly where they stand.
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Shakhtar keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
Hapoel Kiryat Shmona asked and Gimnasia La Plata said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Add another name to the list: Bnei Yehuda have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Or Hasin. The answer from Hapoel Kiryat Shmona has not changed — yet.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Yaw Ackah 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 had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Hapoel Kiryat Shmona, and both men came out saying it was fine.
A manager forgives a bad Saturday far more readily than a bad Tuesday, because one of them he can explain and the other one he chose. The reports this week have not been good.
In brief
SquadOr Hasin is training like a man with a point to make
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Cruzeiro keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
Nemanja Ljubisavljević 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 is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Matan Cohen 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.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Ben Solomon 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.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Gil Natcho 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. Dan Abada 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.
5 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.
In brief
The dugoutAmit Glazer knocks on the manager’s door
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Nemanja Ljubisavljević and Hapoel Kiryat Shmona agree another 4 years.
Ramzi Safouri 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 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.
Every shape has positions in it and this one does not have his. Hapoel Kiryat Shmona will either change the shape, change his job, or change his club, and he is waiting to hear which.
Still no offer on the table, and Nemanja Ljubisavljević’s deal keeps shrinking. In boardroom language, silence this long stops being an oversight and starts being an answer.
Hapoel Kiryat Shmona have made the call to Shakhtar. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Or Hasin has his answer from Hapoel Kiryat Shmona; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
In brief
The dugoutAmit Glazer asks for a word with the manager