Friday, February 26, 2010

Hapoel Tel-Aviv 0-0 Rubin Kazan


Rubin Kazan were given no cause for alarm in a second-leg stroll to earn a 3-0 aggregate victory over Hapoel Tel-Aviv and a Europa League last-16 clash with Wolfsburg.

Having all but sealed their passage in the first leg, during which Aleksandr Bukharov scored twice and Sergei Semak also found the target, Rubin were content to sit back in Tel-Aviv.

Hapoel struggled to muster a meaningful effort on target as they limply exited the competition, but Rubin will be required to step up a gear in the next round against a Wolfsburg side who thrashed Villarreal.

The first-leg win ended a run of four home draws in European competition for Rubin, including matches against European heavyweights Barcelona and Inter Milan.

The Russian champions dropped into the Europa League despite also beating Barcelona in the Nou Camp in their Champions League group match, while Hapoel reached the knockout stages of the secondary club competition by finishing top of a pool which included Hamburg and Celtic.

But the visitors were not required to reach anything like the standards they set in Barcelona on their visit to Israel.

Hapoel, lacklustre in the first leg, showed little urgency in the first half of the second despite needing an early goal to have any realistic hope of overturning the deficit.

Gonzalez Cesar Navas' foul on Itay Shechter earned the Israeli's a free-kick on the right, but Douglas could only head over from six yards after 17 minutes.

Sergei Ryzhikov made a comfortable save from Gil Vermouth after 21 minutes, with the Hapoel midfielder shooting straight at the visiting stopper from 12 yards.

Shechter also failed to trouble Ryzhikov from similar range in the second minute of the second half, before Bukharov had the visitors' first shot of the evening at the other end, curling a right-footed effort wide from 12 yards.

Shechter shot over from long range after 78 minutes and two minutes later Eran Zahavi dragged a weak shot wide from the edge of the area.

A weak shot by Alan Kasaev from 18 yards was caught by Vincent Enyeama on one of the visitors' few forays forward as they progressed with ease.

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