1/8/2013 : Maccabi Haifa face Latvian side Ventspils tonight in Europa League 3rd qualifying round

Haifa midfielders Gustavo Boccoli and Ruben Rayos yesterday in Latvia

Football:
Maccabi Haifa will start its Europa League 3rd qualifying round tie with FK Ventspils of Latvia tonight in Latvia at 19:00. Haifa will head into the match having notched up a 10-0 aggregate score in the last round against Khazar Lankaran that included an 8-0 win in the away leg. " This game is up to us. Tonight we will be playing a match against a team that is very good in attack", said Haifa's manager Arik Benado to his players in a training session this morning, "They are a tall team and we have to take that into account. I don't want any of you guys to be surprised , start concentrating from the first second of the match". Ventspils beat in Jeunesse Esch of Luxembourg 5-1 on aggregate in the last round to set up this tie with Maccabi. In a press conference yesterday Benado said: "We know Ventspils, they are a good team, we watched them in a few games, they have very dangerous attacking players and overall are a good attacking team. We will do all we can to get passed them. It will be a tough game, all away games are, but we must score".  As for the Haifa lineup for tonight's game, it looks like midfielder Avichai Yadin will not play due to a knee injury that he received yesterday that kept him out of this morning's training session.
Haifa's expected lineup:
GK: Bojan Saronov, DF: Elad Gabai, Dekel Keinan, Taleb Twatiha, Edin Cocalic, MF: Gustavo Boccoli, Yaniv Katan (captain), Ruben Rayos, Hen Ezra, Alon Turgeman, FW: Shimon Abuhatzira.
(You can watch the match live on sport5 tonight from 19:00)

Other Europa League fixtures tonight:
Pandurii vs Hapoel Tel Aviv (21:00)
Estoril vs Hapoel Ramat Gan (22:00)

Dario Fernandez (sport5)

 Hapoel Haifa have signed Argentine midfielder Dario Fernandez on a 2 year deal. Fernandez became available yesterday after his last club, Beitar Jerusalem, released him due to the fact that he made some negative comments about the club to manager Eli Cohen during a training session two weeks ago. The 34-year-old is expected to receive about $120,000 per season at the Haifa club. In signing Fernandez became just the 5th none-Israeli in the Hapoel Haifa roster for next season.