Blue-and-white bowls over host Moldova
Zahavi, Solomon, Dabbur, Natcho tally in 4-1 rout for maiden conquest of World Cup qualifying
The Israel National Team defeated Moldova 4-1 late Wednesday night in Chisinau at Stadionul Zimbru to record its first win of the 2022 World Cup campaign and pick up three valuable points.
The hosts dominated the early goings and took a shock 1-0 lead via Catalin Carp, but Eran Zahavi leveled the score on the stroke of halftime.
Five minutes into the second half, Ion Nicolaescu was shown a straight red card for pushing Loai Taha to the ground, giving the blue-and-white a man advantage. With the extra player on the pitch, Willi Ruttensteiner’s squad quickly picked up the pace and scored three goals in under 10 minutes as Manor Solomon, Munas Dabbur and captain Bibras Natcho all found the back of the goal to bring the maiden victory home.
The win moved Israel into third place in Group F with four points, while Denmark
with nine points and Scotland with five are in first and second places, respectively, as Austria sits in fourth with four points ahead of Faroe Islands and Moldova with one point apiece.
“We played a poor first half as the players were tired,” said Ruttensteiner. “But the National Team showed character and we recorded a good win. I saw some very positive things and i am happy.”
Israeli superstar Zahavi also reflected on the game.
“We went a goal down in a game that wasn’t easy. We now have four out of nine possible points and we move on. I felt a sense of personal responsibility that I had to help the National team and I scored at a critical moment of the game right at halftime.
This was a very important result.”
The victory over Moldova came after the blue-and-white drew 1-1 with Scotland and fell to Denmark 2-0 in its first two games of the competition, both of which took place at Bloomfield Stadium in Israel.
The next window of qualifiers will take place in September 2021 when Israel will play Austria and Faroe Islands for the first time in this campaign.
The last time Israel and Austria played was in 2017 as the clubs played to a 1-1 draw in an International Friendly. Prior to that contest, the squads competed in the 2010 World Cup qualifiers, when Israel won both matches as it holds an all-time record of three wins, three draws and no losses in six games.
The blue-and-white has played Faroe Islands three times overall, last in 2005, with a record of two wins, no losses and a draw.
Moldova entered Wednesday night’s contest after getting slammed by Denmark 8-0 while splitting the points in a 1-1 draw with Faroe Islands.
Moldova controlled the pace of play early on with a number of dangerous chances, and its efforts paid off in the 29th minute when Carp scored off a right-side corner kick after Israel defender Eitan Tibi couldn’t properly clear the ball to give the hosts a surprising 1-0 lead.
While it looked as if Moldova was going to take the slim advantage into the break, Dor Peretz sent a perfect through ball right onto the feet of an oncoming Zahavi, who easily slotted it home at the stroke of halftime to give Israel a 1-1 tie after 45 minutes of play.
Five minutes into the second half saw Moldova drop to 10 men when Nicolaescu was issued a straight red card after pushing Israeli central defender Taha to the ground, handing Ruttensteiner’s team a numerical advantage for the balance of the match.
With the extra man, Israel took control and began to attack in waves with the first goal coming under 10 minutes after the incident as Solomon slammed home a Zahavi rebound to give Israel a 2-1 lead.
Israel added an insurance marker in the 64th minute when ’keeper Alexei Koșelev fumbled Eli Dasa’s cross that Dabbur stuffed behind the shot-stopper, while two minutes later Natcho scored from the top of the box off a defection to put the exclamation mark on the resounding win.