Kenny Miller: "If we replicate the level from Sofia, we will be in a very good place"

Maccabi Tel Aviv has finished its preparations for tomorrow's away match (Thursday, 21:30, Sport1) in Switzerland against Lugano, in the playoff round of the Conference League qualifiers.

At the press conference, coach Kenny Miller said:

"We held an early morning training session and then set out on our longest flight so far this season to be here at the stadium. We are looking forward to the game. The conditions here are obviously different from what we are used to, it looks like it will rain here and I am sure the players will get used to it. Despite the disappointment of not continuing in the Europa League, we showed a very high level of performance against CSKA Sofia. If we replicate this level tomorrow, we will be in a very good place."

On the start of the season: "We started the season well. Out of six matches, we won five and played wonderful football. We will aim to continue in this line tomorrow as well. We are at a challenging point in the season with a tight schedule of Thursday-Sunday-Thursday, and we need to make sure we use the squad correctly. The preparation for tomorrow was mainly about recovery and rest, to make sure everyone arrives as fresh as possible."

When asked about the squad available to him, the coach added: "It definitely helps that we have more selection options. We lost a number of important players for the match last weekend and the squad looked a bit short, so it is good to travel with additional players returning from suspensions and minor injuries. Our approach is always to come and win the game. The players' mindset is to show up and display our ability, and we are confident in ourselves."

Osher Davida said about the opponent: "Lugano is not a simple team at all. We saw them and analyzed them, they are a good team, but we are also a good team and we will come tomorrow to show it. You always know there is another game next week and no team goes all-in in the first game, but in my opinion, you need to focus on this as a single game, not think about the second leg, but play what we know and win."

On the tight schedule: "We are already used to this sequence of Thursday-Sunday-Thursday. We like it, we are grateful that this is the situation and we want this sequence to continue as long as possible."