"Israel remains in my heart and that's why I'm here," coach Paulo Souza said briefly, just before he entered the hotel where the Maccabi Haifa players are staying and was warmly received by the club's president, Ya'akov Shahar.
Sousa these days is not a coach after he left the Polish national team in favor of Flamengo and was fired from the Brazilian luxury club.
The Portuguese is remembered by the Israeli public mainly from his time as coach of Maccabi Tel Aviv, with whom he won the championship and from there he continued to prestigious clubs such as the Italian Fiorentina.
Souza highly appreciates Maccabi Haifa.
He immediately took a gift out of his car and gave it to the members of the professional team of the Greens, including assistant coach Guy Sarfati.
In general, the presence of the Israeli champion in one of the main hotels in Lisbon arouses interest among the locals as well.
The reason: the most flashy acquisition player who came to Benfica, the German midfielder Julian Drexler, is in the same hotel where the Haifa players are staying.
This morning (Tuesday) he got into a luxurious Mercedes with an attached driver and went to the hotel where Banfika is located.
The president of the club, Yaakov Shahar, is close to the players.
Despite being the owner and having many people managing under him, he makes sure that nothing is missing, down to the smallest details.
"It's important to Yankela that the conditions shock the class," said Maccabi Haifa, "at least from this point of view, we've been in the Champions League for many years, but the desire is to have an answer to every detail for the players."
Meanwhile, the players themselves went through a tactical briefing and the professional team went through a video of the Portuguese.
"It's a game of minimum mistakes, because on this stage there is no room for mistakes," clarified players in the team who added: "We know what needs to be done and the excitement should explode on the grass."
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