Hapoel Be'er Sheva
Also written as H. Beer Sheva, Hapoel Beer Sheva.
The club
Hapoel Be'er Sheva were founded on 1 May 1949 in Be'er Sheva in southern Israel. They play at the Turner Stadium, which holds 16,126 and has been their home since 2015-16; before that they were at the Vasermil Stadium from 1960, and before 1959 at a ground in the old city. They wear red and white and are known as the Camels, and as the Reds from the South. The businesswoman Alona Barkat has owned and run the club since 2007, a takeover that turned a second-division side into the dominant Israeli club of the late 2010s. Nir Katz is chairman. The club's own website currently styles the team Hapoel "Victory" Be'er Sheva, a sponsor name.
Recent seasons
Hapoel finished second in the Israeli Premier League in 2021-22, second in 2022-23, third in 2023-24 and second in 2024-25, winning the State Cup in 2024-25 and the Super Cup in 2025.
In 2025-26 they won the league, their sixth Israeli championship and their first since 2017-18. Across the 36-match regular season and championship round they won 24, drew 7 and lost 5, scoring 79 and conceding 38, and finished on 79 points ahead of Beitar Jerusalem and Maccabi Tel Aviv. They also reached the 2025-26 State Cup final and lost it, and were runners-up in the 2026 Super Cup. The club has now spent 53 seasons in the top division, counting 2026-27.
Honours and landmarks
Six league titles: 1974-75, 1975-76, 2015-16, 2016-17, 2017-18 and 2025-26. Four State Cups: 1996-97, 2019-20, 2021-22 and 2024-25, with five losing finals including 2025-26. Five Super Cups: 1975, 2016, 2017, 2022 and 2025. Three Toto Cups. One Lilian Cup, in 1988. Three second-division titles, the last in 2000-01.
Hapoel Be'er Sheva were, with Beitar Jerusalem, the first Israeli club to play in European competition, in 1976-77, and with Hapoel Tel Aviv the first to play in the UEFA Cup, in 1994-95. Their record season is 2016-17: 85 points, 26 wins, 73 goals and a goal difference of 55, all club records. Shlomo Iluz holds the appearance record with 515 league games and Shalom Avitan the scoring record with 100 league goals.
Notable scorelines
The heaviest defeat by any Israeli club in European competition is Hapoel Be'er Sheva's 0-10 against Roda JC in 1997-98. Their largest State Cup win is the 7-0 semi-final victory over Hapoel Afula in 2014-15, also a record margin for an Israeli cup semi-final.
The results the club is remembered for came in 2016-17. In the Champions League play-off they lost the first leg 5-2 at Celtic Park and won the return 2-0 in Be'er Sheva, going out 5-4 on aggregate. Dropping into the Europa League group stage they beat Inter Milan twice, 3-2 in Israel and 2-0 at San Siro, drew 0-0 and 1-1 with Southampton, and reached the round of 32, where they lost to Beşiktaş 1-3 at home and 1-2 away.
European record
Hapoel Be'er Sheva's European history began with the 1976 Intertoto Cup, in which they won their first match against Køge. They have reached the Europa League group stage three times, in 2016-17, 2017-18 and 2020-21, and the Conference League group stage once, in 2022-23. Their best run remains the 2016-17 Europa League round of 32.
They have played Champions League qualifying in 2016-17, 2017-18 and 2018-19, and again in 2026-27. In 2016-17 they beat Sheriff Tiraspol and Olympiacos in qualifying before losing the play-off to Celtic; in 2017-18 they beat Honvéd and Ludogorets Razgrad before losing the play-off to Maribor. They played in the Cup Winners' Cup in 1997-98 and the Intertoto Cup in 1976, 1994 and 2004.
Because of the Gaza war, Israeli clubs have been required by UEFA to play their home matches at neutral venues until further notice, and Hapoel's European home legs this summer have been played in Hungary.
Quotes
No directly quoted material was confirmed from the sources read here. The club's own match reports and news items published in the current window are written in the third person and carry no attributed speech.
Right now (2026/27)
Ran Kojok, also transliterated Ran Kozuch, is the head coach. The squad has taken on Portuguese full-back Pedro Amador on a four-year contract, and the club's declared foreign contingent for 2026-27 also includes Djibril Diop, Javon East, João Victor and Lucas Ventura.
Hapoel entered the Champions League as Israeli champions at the second qualifying round and have won three ties. Against Víkingur Reykjavík they lost the first leg 2-1 in Iceland on 21 July 2026, Kings Kangwa scoring for Hapoel, then won the return 2-0 on 29 July at the Haladás Sportkomplexum in Szombathely, Hungary, through Zahi Ahmed on 65 minutes and Amir Ganah on 80, before a crowd of 397; 3-2 on aggregate.
The tie they have just completed is the third qualifying round against Red Star Belgrade, and it has gone entirely their way. Hapoel won the first leg 1-0 on Tuesday 4 August 2026, again in Szombathely and again in front of a near-empty ground, 882 spectators. Zahi Ahmed scored on 38 minutes, robbing a Red Star centre-back after pressing with Igor Zlatanović. Matan Baltaxa was sent off for two bookings on 60 minutes and the goalkeeper Ofir Marciano kept Red Star out. In the second leg at the Red Star Stadium on Tuesday 11 August 2026, in front of 40,833, Hapoel won 2-0 through Igor Zlatanović on 61 minutes and Javon East on 79. They go through 3-0.
That puts them into the Champions League play-off round against Sabah of Azerbaijan, the first leg on 19 August 2026 and the second on 25 August at the Tofiq Bahramov Republican Stadium in Baku. From the play-off onwards Hapoel will host their home matches at the Giulești Arena in Bucharest, a 14,050-seat ground that is Rapid Bucharest's home, having played the earlier rounds in Szombathely; the club announced the move on 11 August 2026 and said the same stadium would be used for the league phase.
The Israeli Premier League season has not yet begun. The club's fixture list has Hapoel away to Hapoel Haifa at the Sammy Ofer Stadium on 15 August 2026.
Sources
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hapoel_Be%27er_Sheva_F.C. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hapoel_Be%27er_Sheva_F.C._in_European_football https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2025%E2%80%9326_Israeli_Premier_League https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026%E2%80%9327_Israeli_Premier_League https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026%E2%80%9327_UEFA_Champions_League_qualifying_phase_and_play-off_round https://hbsfc.co.il/ https://hbsfc.co.il/news/
Researched and written for not4quarters. Where a fact could not be established from the sources read, this page says so rather than guessing.