Benfica started last season under the leadership of Jorge Jesus, but made a lot of mistakes already at the start of the championship, allowing Sporting and Porto to go into a decent gap in the first round. After the dismissal of Jesus, Nelson Verissimo was called to change the situation, but it was not possible to overtake the competitors. The Eagles finished third and were forced to participate in the Champions League qualification. Roger Schmidt was already preparing the team for a tough fight for participation in the main club tournament in Europe. The German specialist last season with PSV fought with Benfica for a place in the group, but lost the fight to the Eagles, while his efforts did not go unnoticed. The Portuguese left Midtjylland and Dynamo Kiev out of the tournament. In the national championship, Benfica started superbly and definitely set themselves the most serious tasks in the current season. Having won all five matches at the start, the Eagles currently lead the standings, being ahead of the second Braga by two points. In the summer, the team has traditionally earned more than 100 million euros from the sale of Darwin Nunez to Liverpool, Roman Yaremchuk to Club Brugge and Everton to Flamengo. At the same time, the “eagles” were decently spent. Major signings include David Neres from Shakhtar Donetsk, Enzo Fernandez from Argentinean River Plate and Julian Draxler, who joined Benfica on loan from PSG.
Maccabi Haifa is a pioneer for all Israeli football in the Champions League. The Greens became the first club in the country’s history to break into the group. In 2003 Maccabi made a splash when they managed to finish third, behind Bayer and Manchester United, only two points behind the Pharmacists. The team then defeated the Red Devils 3:0 at home and left behind the Greek Olympiakos in the table and only one point behind Arsenal, but there are a lot of competitors at the minimum distance from the bottom. For the second time, the Haifa club played in the group of the most prestigious European club championship in the 2009-2010 season, but in the company of Bordeaux, Bayern and Juventus it turned out to be uncompetitive, failing to take a single point. At the same time, the Greens knocked out the Northern Irish Glentoran, Aktobe from Kazakhstan and a very serious rival in the face of Salzburg in qualifying. Maccabi Haifa is remembered by Russian football fans primarily for knocking out CSKA from the 1/16 UEFA Cup in 2007, as well as a sensational victory over Rostov in the Europa League qualification in 2020. In the current season the Greens left the Greek Olympiacos on the way to the group, the Cypriot Apollo and the Serbian champions Red Star are out of the tournament. In July Barak Bahar’s team lost in the country’s Super Cup to Hapoel from Beersheba. However, in the championship it started with three victories in a row and is on the second line in the table, yielding to teammates from Tel Aviv only in additional indicators. More accurate football predictions for today can be obtained from the link provided.
