Hapoel Tel Aviv now know exactly what could be waiting for them at the business end of Conference League qualifying, and it does not get much tougher. Thursday's UEFA playoff draw in Nyon paired the Israeli side with Atalanta, the Italian club who won the Europa League just two years ago — but only if Hapoel first get past a qualifying tie against Poland's GKS Katowice. ONE described it simply as "the hardest there is."
That qualifier comes first. Hapoel face Katowice in the Conference League's third qualifying round, with the first leg on Thursday, August 6, and the return a week later in Poland on August 12. Because of the security situation in Israel, Hapoel's home leg will again be played at their adopted European base, DVTK Stadium in Miskolc, Hungary.
Katowice arrive off the back of their own comeback story, having beaten Slovakia's MŠK Žilina to reach this round. It is no gimme tie for the Israeli side, who will need to manage a two-legged, cross-continental trip before they can even think about Bergamo.
Hapoel's own path to this point has already carried some drama. They eliminated Bulgarian champions Ludogorets Razgrad 4-2 on aggregate, sealing the win with a 2-2 draw away in Razgrad in which forward Emmanuel Boateng scored twice — the second, in the 58th minute, effectively closing out the tie after Ludogorets had briefly threatened a comeback.
Should Hapoel get past Katowice, the reward is a playoff tie against Atalanta, with the first leg in Bergamo on August 20 and the return, again in Miskolc, on August 27. It would be a first taste of continental group-phase football for the Israeli club in well over a decade if they can navigate both rounds.
Atalanta, for their part, are entering the Conference League for the first time in the club's history, having finished seventh in Serie A last season — a campaign that saw them fall short of the Champions League places they had grown used to occupying in recent years.
The Italian side remain one of the more fashionable names in European football regardless of their league finish. Atalanta lifted the Europa League in 2024, thrashing Bayer Leverkusen 3-0 in the Dublin final on the back of an Ademola Lookman hat-trick, ending a 61-year wait for a major trophy.
They go into this campaign under Raffaele Palladino, who took over as head coach in November 2025 after Ivan Jurić was dismissed. Palladino has been backed to keep Atalanta competitive on multiple fronts, and a Conference League run would be a new experience for a club more used to Champions League nights at what is now known as the New Balance Arena in Bergamo.
For Hapoel, simply reaching that stage would be a considerable achievement, let alone competing with a squad of Atalanta's Serie A pedigree. But European football for Israeli clubs has been defined this year by matches played far from home as much as by results on the pitch, and Miskolc's DVTK Stadium will again be the improbable stage if the Katowice tie goes their way.
Nothing is decided yet. Thursday's draw only sets the shape of the road ahead — first Katowice, then, potentially, one of Italian football's most talked-about clubs of the last two seasons.
