Hapoel Tel Aviv's return to continental football keeps getting sterner by the round. Having survived a nervy aggregate victory over Poland's GKS Katowice, the club now knows exactly what stands between them and the Conference League's league phase: Atalanta, the Italian side that lifted the Europa League as recently as 2024.
The draw pits Hapoel against one of the form clubs of European football over the past half-decade. ONE's football podcast, hosted by Itzik Kalpai and Amit Lovintal, spent its latest episode picking apart how far the gap really is and whether manager Elyaniv Barda's side can find a way to trouble a club many still rate among the favorites for the trophy.
The tie is set for two legs later this month. According to reporting from Italy, the first leg is scheduled for August 20 at Atalanta's Bergamo home, now known as the New Balance Arena following last year's naming-rights deal with the American sportswear brand, while the return leg follows on August 27.
That second match will not be played in Israel. Hapoel have been hosting their European fixtures at the DVTK Stadium in Miskolc, Hungary, for security reasons since returning to continental competition, and the Atalanta return leg is expected to be staged there as well.
Hapoel's path to this point was not straightforward. ONE reports the club beat Katowice 3-2 on aggregate, winning the first leg 2-0 before a 2-1 defeat in Wednesday's return fixture proved just enough to see them through on the overall scoreline.
Atalanta arrive as clear favorites on paper. The Bergamo club finished seventh in Serie A last season, a downturn that cost them a place in Europe's top two competitions and dropped them into the Conference League instead, but their pedigree remains formidable — this is still the club that stunned Bayer Leverkusen in the 2024 Europa League final under Gian Piero Gasperini.
Raffaele Palladino has been in charge since replacing Ivan Jurić in November, arriving with a reputation built at Monza and, in particular, at Fiorentina, whom he steered to a sixth-place Serie A finish and a run to the Conference League semi-finals last season.
For Hapoel, simply being in this position marks a landmark. The club is playing in Europe for the first time since the 2014-15 season, having finished fourth in the Israeli Premier League to earn the qualifying berth, and every round survived so far has been treated as a bonus by the fanbase that traveled in numbers to Miskolc.
The podcast also touched on the club's more immediate concerns on the domestic front. Hapoel face Kiryat Shmona in a Toto Cup semi-final on Sunday, with the hosts flagging uncertainty over the availability of winger Shanda Silva heading into a packed August schedule that now includes a two-legged date with one of Italy's biggest clubs.
Nobody around Hapoel is pretending the tie is anything but a mismatch on paper. But after knocking out Katowice and with a full house awaiting in Miskolc for the second leg, the sense within the club, as relayed on ONE's podcast, is that there is nothing to lose in taking their shot at Atalanta.
