Former Maccabi Haifa midfielder Gustavo Boccoli, who played last September in a match against the Barcelona legends at Sami Ofer, was interviewed for the ‘Factors in the Club’ podcast on the Greens website and revealed an interesting detail about the past, in addition to other spicy stories from the time in Israel and in the champion’s uniform.
Bocoli He said: “I don’t blame Eli Ohana for not accepting me to Maccabi Petah Tikva. He told me: ‘You are a good player, but I have room for one foreigner and I need a striker. You are not a striker and I have players in your position’. He may be sorry, but I’m not. If I had stayed at Maccabi Petah Tikva it is possible that within six months I would have returned to Brazil. It took me three years to acclimate, to understand the mentality and then to bring out my best ability.”
On the goal at Anfield: “When we arrived at the stadium, we warmed up and the pitch was huge, the grass was huge, I said to myself ‘how will we get to the goal’. Ronnie found out first that they were going out face to face, so he put me in the middle with Colouti. He told us ‘if you do a double – you will be alone’, as soon as I got the ball and gave it to him I just ran. He turned and handed and suddenly I was alone, it was three seconds, for me it was two hours. I said I have to score, I tried to make a mistake and Raina stood. As soon as you conquer, you start to believe that something can be done, if the reciprocity had been here in Israel, history might have been completely different.”
On the story at Maccabi Tel Aviv: “I was closed with them. When I arrived in Israel, the team I was most inclined to cheer for was Maccabi Tel Aviv, not Maccabi Haifa. Why? I was in RG, in the center, where they only talk about Tel Aviv. After two or three years I was contacted by Maccabi Tel Aviv and my feeling was that I could be there, because I still can’t get to Haifa. Because it’s a high level? Yes. First of all Maccabi Tel Aviv and after that we will see if here or Europe. I didn’t think I could get there from Nazareth”, (as I recall, the story was previously revealed in the latest news).
“I wanted a three-year contract and they had no problem. I sat with Ellie Derricks. There was another meeting and there they started to change things and then they had another meeting. In the third meeting I already saw something that was not right in the conditions so I said I didn’t want to. ‘If you don’t close with us, who will you close with?’ Because at that time there were not many groups with the ability to pay. I said I’m returning to the second division, under these conditions I’m not closing, and I left. They thought I would sign there at any cost, I said I didn’t want to.”
“After 10 days, someone in the management of my brother Nazareth, who used to buy trucks with Yaakov Shahar, called me after a game and said, ‘Do you want to play in Haifa?’ I laughed and said ‘who doesn’t want’, so he told me ‘on Friday meet me in Olga and from there we will go to Volvo’. I said ok, what’s there to lose. My wife and I said if he goes to Tel Aviv we go after him, if he turns right or left we go back. We drove and drove, suddenly Tel Aviv and Volvo, so I said he wasn’t lying.”
“Shahar opened the door, we sat in the office and talked for about an hour about football. Then came a part where he told me let’s talk about it, but do you have something with Maccabi Tel Aviv? If so then I don’t want to interfere. If you closed there then good luck. I told him the story. A month ago, my wife and I made an agreement about what we want and we said who can pay it, only Maccabi Tel Aviv or Haifa. I refused all the teams and Maccabi Tel Aviv I refused a week ago, only Haifa remained that could pay me and my wife’s agreement”.
“Shahar wrote his agreement and gave me the page, it was the settlement stamp of my contract, his was also the same. Three years, X a year, bonus and everything. Only one thing was missing: flights to Brazil that my wife requested, but everything was apart from that. She started crying and then after five minutes I said where I was signing. No argument and nothing. I told him next year you will call me to double the contract and he laughed. A year and a half later he brought me there and we really renewed everything.”
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