Asunto: Israel U20

QUALIFYING GROUP - DAY 2

ISRAEL vs. Saudi Arabia 1:2
'Nedáš - dostaneš' this is golden football rule saying approximately that if you don't take advantage of your big chance or promising attempt your goalkeeper soon pulls the ball from your net. Zeev Livnat didn't succeed from the penalty spot in the end of the 1st half and one minute later Asad Jait scored. We were better with 55% BP, but I started a bit defensively just 4-4-2, so we didn't have a shooting ascendency. That's why I called for 3-4-3 after the half time. Unfortenately it changed the game image just a little, so in 60' I pulled all defenders and midfielders forward (and Or-el closer to the centre). Right after this substitution Raihman's long-distance shot ended in the net. Arabs tried to hold 1 point but made a foul in the penalty area for the second time and it was in 85'. Crucial moment of the game, again Livnat, again no goal, again a counterattack, again a goal in our net.

Egypt vs. Japan 1:1
Very lucky point for Egypt, he again used only 3/5 importance, can score early and lead until 52'. In 50' got another card RM Kouyama and will be missing against us tomorrow.

Slovenia vs. Serbia 1:2
Slovenia has lost another game using 3/5 importance! Unbelievable! What the hell are they doing?! They have stronger team (by 10 points).

Spain vs. Ukraine 0:2
Ukraine was obviously the favorite for this game and they could have saved a bit energy while playing 4/5 in the 1st half.

Just a short review commenting our last two games:

ISRAEL 3:0 Japan
I had been sure they used some kind of long passes (with 1 or 2 forwards). Japan has much stronger defense than midfield, that calls for short passes. 3-5-2 doesn't suit us (as we could have seen last seasons), so I placed 4 midfielders and because of playing home I added 3 forwards. It might have been tricky 3 defenders against their long passes. They surprised me with 3 forwards but we won that bet and from 9 shoots on goal scored three times. Japan endangered Shevet only 3 times, our goalkeeper secured his clean sheet.

Spain 1:0 ISRAEL
I guessed correctly their 4-4-2 focused at the center with long passes. My choice was between 5-3-2 and 4-3-3. It was an away match, so at least 4 deffenders were a must. We played 5-3-2 from the begining, with 4-3-3 switch at the half time in case of losing. We successfully blocked their offense, they produced only 1 shoot on the goal (and 1 shoot wide) but unfortunately scored from that chance. No matter we overshooted them with 14 attempts in total.

Slovenia 1:1 ISRAEL
Slovenia had very weak right side of the defense. They had stroger midfield than defense so my choice were long passes directed straight to their weakest spot. I chose 4-4-2 because it was an away match. This strategy resulted in a tight match. We scored the first but in the end of the first half Slavko Rečnik equalised the match. I tried to win the match with CAM Ilani. But overall satisfaction with this draw - Slovenia was almost 20 points stronger.

ISRAEL 0:1 Ukraine
We were without distanced Or-el, Shushan and Lobotzki so about 6 points weaker than usual. Ukraine has both defense and midfield very strong. I didn't want to hole up and defend 0:0 draw, on the contrary I tried to defeat them offensively, so 3-5-2 (although it didn't suit us previously). Ukraine unfortunately scored in 4', it was tight balanced match like the one with Slovenia, we switched to 3-4-3 in the second half but we weren't lucky enough to score.

ISRAEL 1:0 Serbia
Their LD Gačevič got the red card in 42' it was great chance for us because we were attacking right on this side. In 60' they tried to increase their offensive force, I sent fresh men to the field and one of them Or-el scored in 84'!

So the qualifying group at the "half time":
1st Ukraine ... 15pts
2nd Serbia ... 14pts
3rd Spain ... 12pts
4th ISRAEL ... 10pts
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5th Saudi Arabia ... 7pts
6th Slovenia ... 6pts
7th Egypt ... 6pts
8th Japan ... 4pts

What a shame Livnat wasn't able to convert at least one of the two penalty kicks against Arabia, or scored at least once in Spain. Because Spain was playing this season with 19yrs old players, next season they will be much strogner. But I think that Slovenia will influence this group at most.

I fulfilled my goal which was qualifying at the PPM challenge cup. We will play in the division C for teams at the 33th-48th place in the World Ranking table.

We are currently 38th with 6896pts. To this day we earned 4531pts this season! Only 12 nations collected this season more points than Israel! Czech Republic U20 collected only 3860pts Hope that this great season will continue

That's all for now, I am sorry that I didn't write here weekly

Let me introduce the Group B of the PPM Challenge Cup - Division C We qualified from the 38th position, which means we are playing two home matches at the Group stage (but I think in this tournament the home advantage is not applied). We will move for these matches from Ariel Arena to your stadiums! Read this post to the end and learn more about it. Our opponents will be Canada, Tchai-wan and Venezuela. Our target? GOLD medals!

MONDAY 7th December - CANADA (home)
Stadium: Cubs Arena (38000) - LionCub
Team strength: about 155 (max. this season: 158)
(Israel - TS: less than 150, max: 155)
Canada is the eight-finalist of the World Cup in Season 15, but they didn't manage the last qualification and didn't qualify. They also fell down from the 15th place in the World Ranking table (PPM Division A) through Division B up to this season's appearance in Division C. Canada has 13 players with more than 1400 OR, 7 of these players have more than 1500 OR. (comparison: Israel - 8 above 1400, only Or-el is above 1500) Stefan Cherry is their best player with 1620 OR. Their attack is not so strong, they scored only 8 times (for comparison, only Ron Raihman scored 10 times!). They are using 4-4-2 ("bell shape" with 2 CF.


TUESDAY 8th December - TCHAI-WAN (away)
Team strength: about 150 (max. this season: 151)
Tchai-wan successfully qualified for the last two Championships (but ended in both cases in the group stage). They have 10 players above 1400 OR and from them are 4 above 1500 OR. Their best player Feng Shaohua plays the 3rd league in the Czech republic. This almost 1700 OR forward has rating 60! Our defense must do it's best to secure him! Tchai-wan used against strong teams 5-4-1, otherwise two varieties of 4-4-2. One is very wide, the other is offensive and narrow.


WEDNESDAY 9th December - VENEZUELA (home)
Stadium: Netanya Stadium (16800) - danielftp
Team strength: about 130? (max. this season: 145)
This team consist of 13 player with OR>1400 and 3 of them are above 1500 OR. Charlys Brignani is their best player (only 19-yrs old!). Their biggest success is the qualifying at the World Cup in season 13. Venezuela played this season with several styles, from classic 4-4-2, bell 4-4-2, 5-4-1 to 4-3-3. If they use 4-3-3, our last game could convert into a lottery with many goals

SUMMARY:
This group has three balanced teams and weaker Venezuela. But if we compare players' OR, Canada should be the favorite and we are the outsider. But OR doesn't show players' training, chemistry and so on. I want to win at least one of the first two matches. Sometimes 4 points are enough, but facing Venezuela with less than 3 points would be very tricky.

In the potentional quarterfinals we can meet teams from the group A: Bosnia and Herzegovina, Suitzerland, Denmark or Australia. In this group Australia is probably without the chance and the rest of teams is very balanced.

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COMPETITION
We must stay optimistic, so there is the competition - Do YOU Want to Host Israeli National Team at YOUR STADIUM?
The task is simple - guess the results of all 3 matches (against Canada, Tchai-wan and Venezuela), the one with the best prediction (here is the judging key - 3pts if you guess correctly the winner (or draw), 5pts if you guess correctly the score, 1pt if you guess correctly the number of goals).

The winner will host the next match of our team which I hope will be the quarterfinals!

So make your prediction, support our team watching the games LIVE and enjoy the tournament!

And here is my guess (just for fun)
ISR-CAN 1:1
TCH-ISR 1:1
ISR-VEN 2:0

Tonight is a friendly match on starting in a half an hour against RUSSIA.
I am using only two 20yrs old players (CD Shavit and CM Landau) in the starting eleven, we are playing 3-4-3
GK: Tishbi
D: Keshet[substitution in 45': Green], Shavit, Toledo
M: Toledano[80': Shevet], Ilani, Landau[75': Norman], Golda[55': Nakhum]
F: Zeevi[45':Shikman], Yona, Simkhon[45':Rozenshtein]
Shevet is having a rest, so there's Tishbi's first appearance in the starting eleven in U20. Importance 5/5.

Huh, very lucky draw! They used 5/5 importance, so they were 20 points stronger and they played offensive 3-5-2. In these conditions (and with B-team) is draw with Russia very nice

Great job Jakub, I really like your work.
hope to see you with us for long

Ups, I am so sorry LionCub, I had forgotten to change the stadium so we didn't play at your stadium as promised So we are playing against Venezuela at danielftp's Netanya stadium (better change it immediately... ) and you will host the next match (I hope we will play at this tournament at least one more home match) at your Cubs arena, ok?

And now about Canada... Well nothing to comment because of their 1/5 importance... As I saw, Venezuela is playing 1/5 as well (Tchai-wan 5/5) hope they will keep it. I started against Canada with 3-4-3 focused at the right side, at the half time switch to 4-4-2.

I started defensively (probably too much) 4-4-2 securing our right side (RD sector) while attacking through the left side. They switched to 3-4-3 at the half time (we stayed in 4-4-2). In 53' Raihman scored from the penalty kick (luckily I didn't nominate Livnat for this game ), so we could stay in defensive 4-4-2. Now we have 6pts and almost certainly win the group!

The situation before the last game with Venezuela was a bit tricky. Because if we had lost (with difference bigger than 3 goals) and Tchai-wan had won their last game we could have been eliminated. We played at 16:30 (my time zone) whereas Tchai-wan at 21:30 so I couldn't react on their result and I couldn't save energy with 1/5 importance. I picked very defensive 4-5-1 blocking their right side, but they didn't use 2 RM as in the previous games, but they attacked through the left side with 2 LM! What a shock when I opened the match report... I saved only 1 energy but never more, I was sweating during the game (well during the replay, I am sitting at the during the matches)

Today we are playing against Australia! Do you remember my words? That Australia is without chance? So we get a very nice opponent but we can't underestimate it! So 5/5 an we are going for the victory! We are playing at Cubs Arena, I am sure there will be amazing atmosphere and full stadium pulling us toward victory

Here it is! Fans at the Cubs Arena were watching a tight tactical game, where solid Australian defense didn't give us many chances. Because we are stronger so the offensive tactic was necessary. They used to play with full backs close to the centre where my wing forward is very effective on this. I choosed their weaker side (right). We have two LF, Ben-David and young Yona. Ben-David is slightly better but I placed Yona from the begin and Ben-David was my joker. And he fulfilled this! First he served a ball to Toledo in 68' and ten minutes later he add a second goal which pulls us to the SEMIFINALS!

In the semifinals we meet ESTONIA, they beat Turkey 1:0. Estonia is currently 5points stronger then we are, so I expect another tight game.

Everything is ready for the incoming match against ESTONIA. I have flipped a coin to decide which stadium will host the match and it is again Cubs Arena (LionCub). We have currently in the team 7 "cubs", so they can profit from home stadium twice There is also one more surprise for Cubs' fans, which will come to light with the match beginning I am (at least) at home from the college (I study mathematic at the Charles University in Prague) so I can watch (at least) the match live So keep your fingers crossed and see you after the match

Ouch... I want to see the report, but:
8 free kicks
5 corner kicks
10 shoots (well, only 1 at the target)
6 offsides
activity during all match

Opponent?
passive play
10 fouls
4 yellow cards
only 2 shoots wide

but 1 penalty kick = 0:1 loss.

Report in few minutes will say more...