State News

Maccabi Hakoah's under-12s futsal side came from third spot to clinch the Football NSW Super League crown last weekend.

The boys won both the minor and preliminary semi-finals to reach the decider, and continued to rise to the occasion by clinching a dramatic grand final against Phoenix - who had beaten Maccabi 5-0 earlier this year - in penalties.

On Grand Final day, Maccabi started the match with confidence, closing down the opposition in their own half. The relentless pressure soon resulted in Maccabi going 1-0 up, with a goal scored by Ran Macovich.

Not long after, a momentary lapse in concentration allowed the opposition to equalise.

This did not deter the boys and they continued to play a brilliant brand of Futsal, keeping possession for long periods of time and were soon rewarded with a goal by Tal Weiner.

With Maccabi leading 2-1 at the break, the players knew that the opposition would be determined in the second period. Both teams played with intensity and as the clock was running down Maccabi conceded a goal to send the game into extra time.

The boys were exhausted but knew they would have to maintain their intensity and composure to win against the minor premiers. They had a number of opportunities that were not converted and late in the second period of extra time and against the run of play Pheonix snatched the lead with a well taken goal.

With only minutes remaining the vast crowd thought that Maccabi had fallen at the last minute - but not this group of high achievers.

Within 30 seconds, a brilliant goal from Josiah Gwozdecky equalled the score at 3-all with the match destined to go to penalty shoot out.

It took ten spot-kicks for Maccabi to win the grand final, with the winning spot kick delivered by Elliot Lipschitz.

There was great jubilation amongst the player and parents at the post game Football New South Wales presentation to the team, knowing that their achievement was the highest ever attained by a Maccabi U12’s Futsal team.

Under the expert coaching of Steve Knight, Jarrod Basger and Jordon Mundell, the newly formed-U12’s squad trained hard and played with great enthusiasm and improved with every game. The team developed into a cohesive unit and finished the regular season in third place, despite only boasting three players - Jared Kadar, Tal Weiner and Josiah Gwozdecky - with experience from last year.

Thanks to Peter Kadar for this report.