Liberec
Referees: Evans - Edwards, Roberts (all from Wales).
YC: 58. Sackey, 61. Bartošák, 78. Delarge - 17. Borcal, 71. Kassio, 75. Ostvind, 90. Mizrachi.
Diváci: 5400
Commentary
The European cups have come back to Liberec and brought an Isreali team with them, the Hapoel Ironi Kiryat Shmona. Not knowing what to expect, 5,400 fans filled the U Nisy stadium to support their team.
Slovan could have opened the scoring half an hour in when a cross by Vladimír Coufal got to Josef Šural, but the shot by the hard shooter got destroyed by goalkeeper Guy Haimov.
Couple of minutes later, Coufal came up with another great pass, this time springing Dzon Delarge who danced his way around the defence, got Haimov out of position and then found the open goal to make it 1-0 late in the fist half.
Shmona had their chances, too, even though the home team was visibly better most of the time. Following a terrible error by David Hovorka, goalie Tomáš Koubek had to be on his A-game to prevent the visitors from scoring.
With six minutes left, Lukáš Bartošák crossed the ball in and it deflected off of goalie Haimov right to Albanian striker Herolind Shala who, in his first game for Slovan, scored an insurance goal and made it 2-0.
However, late misplay by Isaac Sackey, who might have been a victim of a foul on the play, led to a 2-1 goal by Ahmed Abed and so Shmona was to go back home with a pretty big hope to advance.
