Hello to everyone! Here is the update on our game tomorrow. We will play Uruguay, the winner of Group C at 9 am on Field 2 at Bait Vagan. This is the artificial turf field that is 98 yards long by 62 yards wide! A poatage stamp size field like the grass one we played on in 2013. Kyle our trainer and I just returned from walking off the field dimensions. Does this surprise me? Of course not, as we are the only team to have not played on artificial turf fields during the group stage games. This game will be a war, but we can handle the style that Uruguay employs...dirty with delaying tactics. I believe we can press them hard and limit any space they have to play in, thus creating an advantage for us. At least that's our plan at the moment. So, please keep us in your thoughts with good wishes and hopefully, we will get to the semi finals and Medal round the very next day. I look forward to reporting good news tomorrow morning. Take good care, Coach G from Jerusalem

So, good morning USA! Well, it's deja vu all over again. Just as we did and had to do in 2013, we won our final group stage game against Australia 2:0. Truth be told, it should have been at least 5-7 goals, as we couldn't finish clear chances inside the box. That being said, we did all the simple and smart things today to qualify us for the quarter finals. I will find out our opponent later this afternoon. It could be one of three teams, Uruguay, Brazil or Canada. Since we finished 2nd in our group, behind Great Britain, we will play the winner of that group, as it was in 2013. Today Stephen Elias scored the opening goal at the 30 minute mark on an assist from Alec Weiss. Later in the first half we had a penalty kick, but missed. So half ended with the USA 1 and Australia 0. We came out in the second half on fire, taking many chances, but nothing to show for it. Finally in the 61st minute Jake Rozhansky scored on another assist from Alec Weiss. So the score of 2:0 would stand and send us through to the quarter finals for the second consecutive Maccabiah. Everyone got to play in this game, for which I am very happy. I think now we have found a nice rhythm to our game, creating the flow we needed to be successful. It was a great team win, with our backs against the wall in this all or nothing game. We certainly handled the pressure like champions and I look forward to continuing this journey on Wednesday. Winning on Wednesday, will send us to the semi finals the next day on Thursday afternoon. It's really nice when a team of players know what's at stake and don't run and hide from it, but rather attack it with every ounce of energy and fortitude and accomplish their goal. I'm extremely proud of each of these young men, for handling this game, like they did, after such a difficult loss the day before to Great Britain. They had hit bottom and instead of feeling sorry for themselves, they hit it and bounced back up even higher! So on to the quarters on Wednesday and another "shot at glory"!

I wish you all a wonderful day and please keep us in your thoughts for Wednesday! Coach G from Jerusalem

Good morning to all in the good old USA! I hope all is well. So, this morning we had our second game in group stage against Great Britain. We did not play particularly well the entire game, and for some reason we lacked focus for 90 minutes. However, we hung in against a very tall and extremely physical team. With about 6 minutes remaining in the game and the score still 0:0, we made a tactical decision to go from our 3 back defensive line, to a 4 back line in order to hold the score at 0:0 and get out with a draw and get the one point. With 4 minutes remaining we gave up a corner from the left side and they sent in a ball to their 6'5" striker who was left unmarked and headed it home on our near post to make the score 1:0 for Great Britain. We then pushed forward to try and get the equalizer, but with about 30 seconds remaining, we hit a great shot from distance that hit the post and the game ended at 1:0 for Great Britain. We are now in exactly the same situation we found ourselves in before our final group stage game against Mexico in 2013. We had to win to advance to the quarter finals and we did and the rest was history. Our backs are again against the wall and all we need to do is win to get to the quarter finals. We certainly can do it, but we have remain concentrated and focused for 90 minutes, because Australia is very similar to Great Britain in size and in how they play both offensively and defensively. If we play simple and let the ball work for us with runs wide and off the ball, we will win the game. We just have to focus on the task at hand in this all or nothing game. We play Australia at 9:00 am, on the same small field we have been playing on in Bait Vagan. So, until tomorrow I will say goodbye for now with hopes that I will be writing tomorrow about our victory and securing our quarter final spot. Take care all, Coach G.

Good morning to all. It is the morning after the Opening Ceremony and now it is time to recap the event. I must tell you, like all previous ones, it was a very long day. We gathered in our hotel lobby to bus over to the site for the ceremony at 1:15 pm. We eventually departed about 2:30 pm and arrived at the holding area at 2:45 pm. We then went to the holding area until about 7:30 pm and then began the procession towards the stadium to march in as a delegation. By the time we marched into your Teddy Stadium in Jerusalem, it was after 9:30 pm. So it was a very congested and long build up to the actual marching in. But, once we entered the stadium with over 35,000 people in the stands cheering, the goose bumps returned, as that moment is a wonderful and exhilarating moment in time as the previous three were. It is truly hard to put into words all the emotions one feels when representing your country on such a large platform with so many others. it continues to be a spectacle beyond imagination and emotions. The best way for me to try and explain just a little bit is through some photos I took as we marched in and during the extravaganza. We returned to our hotel about 11:45 pm. Today we rest all morning and then have a light training session at 3:00 pm to prepare for our very hard game with Great Britain on Sunday at 9:00 am. We need a good result to lock down our spot in the quarter finals before we play Australia on Monday morning at 9 am to conclude the group play. So until Sunday, I will say goodbye for noe and let you enjoy the moment of the Opening Ceremony through the following photos. Evin Nadaner, was honored from our team by carrying the Maccabi USA Banner into the stadium and here is that wonderful photo. I was extremely proud to have one of our players honored in such a tremendous way. In the photos from top to bottom, they are Evin Nadaner far right holding the banner after marching in; me and Dr. Marc Backal; Kovi Konowiecki, Aaron Franco and me; me, Jake Rozhansky, Kovi, Stephen Elias, Aaron, Josh Haberman, Max Kurtzman and Ryan Jones; Aaron on shoulder of one of our players singing and exciting the group; some of the crowd in stadium; Fireworks; Fireworks, marching in; me with my German hat given to me by a friend on the German Team who played at Fortuna Düsseldorf and against us in 2013; me, Mike Erush, coach of Masters 35 team and Wendi Whitman, coach of our women's open team; our group again.

Hello everyone! Well we moved from Ramat Gan to our competition hotel, The Ramada in Jerusalem yesterday. Everything went ok and we are now settled in. Today we began our tournament play against Venezuela at 4:00 pm and it was extremely hot. The end result was USA 3:0 over Venezuela. But that is only half the story. First, let me tell you how we scored. Our first goal was from a Penalty Kick, as a result of our player being taken down in the box. Stephen Elias stepped up and calmly put it home to give us an early goal at the 2 minute 26 second mark of the game. That was all the scoring in the first half, as we had over 90% of the possession, but couldn't find the back of the net. We were struggling as Venezuela was putting 10 players deep and we kept trying to dribble and we would lose the ball. At halftime we talked about how we are supposed to play with quick passing and not dribbling into trouble. The 2nd half began and we decided to play simple soccer by passing quickly and making hard runs to take the defense away, thus opening up lanes to get into and that opened up our scoring chances. We had a lot of good shots early in the 2nd half and eventually, in the 80th minute, we scored our 2nd goal. Elijah Lichtenberg played a terrific ball to Jake Rozhansky breaking into that open lane for a great finish! A few minutes later, in the 85th minute, Elijah played another great ball to Jake Rozhansky, who then played it across to Ryan Jones who hit it home for our final goal of the game. The other half of the story as I mentioned above, was that Venezuela was perhaps the dirtiest team I have ever coached against in my career. They kept baiting us by kicking, shoving and head butting us, to the point that a fight nearly broke out and they finally got a player thrown out late in the game. Our players legs were all bloodied by the cleats of their players. The continued to try and start something after the game to the point we took another bus back to our hotel, rather than ride with them on the bus that brought us both to the field. My good friend, Mark Knue had a group of people he was touring with and took us back on his bus. Oh, I guess I didn't mention this, but in this tournament the two teams playing each other ride over and back on the same bus! In the organizers infinite wisdom they never consider issues between teams and the Venezuelan's threatened our team with harm on the bus and in the hotel. So, I made the decision to ride backwith my friends bus. These were the issues I flew over to Israel in March to address, but I was unsuccessful in my efforts. I'm sure I will get in trouble with the games committee, but my players needed to be out and away from that environment. So, on Sunday, we play a very big and talented Great Britain team, who all play together in a league on the London Lions club. The following day, we will end group play against Australia, who are also a very big and talented team. We definitely have a tough road ahead to get to the Quarer Finals, but we will be successful and it was extremely important that we started off with a big win in our opening game. The next few days will be resting and regeneration days and the Opening Ceremony is tomorrow evening at 8:00 pm and one of our players, Evin Nadaner, who was MVP in the 2013 tournament, was given the great honor to help carry out Banner into the Stadium. So until later, here are a few pictures from our game:

Coach G. from Jerusalem

Good evening all and I hope this finds everyone well and getting ready for a great 4th of July! We just returned about 30 minutes ago from our visits to the Dead Sea, Masada and a Bedouin tent dinner. The Dead Sea is the lowest point on earth and Masada is my favorite site to visit in Israel. Tomorrow we travel back to Jerusalem to visit Yad Vashem, the Holocaust Museum and then Mount Herzl. After we return around 10 pm we were successful in getting a lighted fieldbto train on until 11:30 pm. We are very happy about having this session, even late at night. We open tournament play on July 5, so a good session is very much needed. Belowcare some photos from our journey to Madada. So, until tomorrow evening, I will say good night from Ramat Gan, Israel, Coach G.

Good evening from Ramat Gan once again. Today we did not have training, but we did tour some caves in Bet Gervin. Typically, I do not like caves and today was no exception! I did one labyrinth cave and no more, as that was enough to last my lifetime! After the caves, we went to Latrun, where the armored tanks are and toured those and had a film on the history of tank warfare. It us always a special place for me to visit. As has been our custom since the 2009 games and again in 2013 with taking a photo of our team on top of the tank, we continued that custom today with our 2017 team. The photo is below. Tomorrow, we were scheduled to play a friendly with Mexico, then take our tour to the Dead Sea, Masada and have dinner at a Bedouin Tent. But, due to projected extreme heat, our medical team cancelled all training for all teams. This has caused us to miss training and if we can't arrange an evening session on Monday, after our tour to Yad Vashem (Holocaust Museum), Mini Israel and the B'nai Mitzvah programs, we will have gone 4 days without a proper training session. We are certainly trying to arrange that practice for about 10:30 pm Monday night. When I write about our trips tomorrow, I will be able to update you on our training. So, until tomorrow night, I will say goodnight from Ramat Gan.