- October 6, 2026
- 9:54 pm
- World News
Back in August 2026, the story of Ukrainian footballer Oleksiy Hutsulyak and Maccabi Haifa seemed almost finished. The Haifa club twice returned to the candidacy of the Ukrainian winger, but the transfer did not take place. At that time, the footballer had several overseas directions, and Israel remained just one of the options.
Author: Elena Gunko
October 6, 2026, the picture is already different.
Israeli Sport5 reported that the 28-year-old Ukrainian national team player is now ready to continue his career in Israel. The main problem has not disappeared: according to the publication, Hutsulyak expects approximately 1.5 million euros net per season and admits that part of the total amount may be arranged as a signing bonus.
For Israeli football, this is a very high financial bar. Therefore, today’s news does not yet mean that a contract with Maccabi is close. It means something else: the position of the footballer himself has noticeably changed over the past two months.
In August, NANews thoroughly analyzed the two attempts of Maccabi Haifa to agree with Hutsulyak. At that time, it was important to separate the facts from the beautiful but too simple formula “the Ukrainian refused to go to Israel.” The transfer really did not take place twice, but there was no public statement from Hutsulyak about his unwillingness to play in Israel.
Now Sport5 is effectively removing this question: Israel suits the footballer.
Why Maccabi returned to Hutsulyak
The first interest from Haifa appeared in the summer when Hutsulyak had already left Zhytomyr’s Polissya and became a free agent. For the reader in Israel: Polissya is a club of the Ukrainian Premier League, the top division of Ukrainian football. In recent seasons, the team from Zhytomyr has been actively investing in the squad and trying to establish itself among the clubs in the upper part of the championship.
A free agent can move to a new team without paying a transfer fee to the previous club. This makes the deal easier but not necessarily cheaper. The player and his representatives in such a situation often try to get part of the savings through increased salary, signing bonus, and other payments.
In August, Maccabi’s need for an attacking player became more acute after Manuel Benson’s serious injury. The right winger of Haifa injured his anterior cruciate ligament and meniscus and was effectively out for a long time.
Haifa turned to Hutsulyak again.
On August 19, Ukrainian sports sources reported that this was already the second attempt by Maccabi to agree with the footballer. It, like the first, ended without a contract.
In the summer, such a position had its own logic. Hutsulyak was counting on a strong overseas contract, and among the possible directions were Belgium, Turkey, Israel, and clubs in the Middle East. While the market was open, waiting for a more profitable offer made sense.
But the season started, and the offers did not turn into a contract.
Four months without a club is no longer a pause
By early October, Hutsulyak remains without a team.
This is where the story changes the most.
The Ukrainian national team player has a name, statistics, and international experience, but clubs evaluate not only past seasons. They need to understand what condition the player is in now, how long it will take him to return to game rhythm, and how quickly he can endure full matches.
Ukrainian journalist Mykhailo Spivakovsky, whom Sport5 refers to, considers mid-October an important boundary. If Hutsulyak continues to remain without a team, his negotiating position will become weaker.
For a national team player, this is especially sensitive. Training individually or with a private coach does not replace daily work within a team, contact with partners, and official matches.
That is why the October readiness to consider Israel sounds completely different than it might have sounded in July.
NANews — News of Israel | Nikk.Agency has already written that Haifa has been closely watching the Ukrainian market in recent years. In the summer, Maccabi was also associated with another notable Ukrainian story — goalkeeper Heorhiy Yermakov, for whom the club expected to receive about 3–3.2 million euros.
We analyzed this story in detail separately.
Therefore, interest in Hutsulyak does not look like a random episode. For Maccabi, the Ukrainian market has long become one of the directions for finding players, and for Ukrainian footballers, the Israeli championship remains a real overseas route — especially when options in Western Europe do not work out.
Money remains the main obstacle
Sport5 writes that Hutsulyak wants about 1.5 million euros net per season. In the Israeli sports press, the word net means the amount the player should receive after taxes.
For Maccabi Haifa, this is a serious burden on the budget even without a transfer fee.
According to Sport5, Hutsulyak’s side is ready to discuss the structure of the deal: part of the money can be paid as a signing bonus, that is, a separate bonus for the very fact of signing the contract.
This scheme is often used in European football when the club and the player try to distribute the total cost of the agreement between salary and one-time payments. It can facilitate negotiations but does not make the player himself cheaper.
Therefore, it is important not to confuse two news items here.
First: Hutsulyak is ready to play in Israel.
Second, which is not yet there: Maccabi Haifa agreed to his financial terms.
Sport5 reports precisely the first.
Why they continue to fight for Hutsulyak at all
Four months without a club does not cancel the fact that we are talking about a Ukrainian national team player in a good football age.
In the last Ukrainian championship, Hutsulyak scored eight goals and made six assists in 26 matches, reports Sport5. He played for Karpaty, Desna, Dnipro-1, and Polissya, and his main position is the right flank of the attack.
At the same time, Hutsulyak is not tied to just one role. He can move closer to the center, play higher, and cover several attacking positions.
For the Ukrainian national team, he has 16 matches and six goals. In 2025, he scored five times for the national team and became one of its most productive players.
Sport5 estimates his market value at about three million euros and provides overall performance statistics in the Ukrainian championship — 56 goals and 36 assists in 280 matches.
That is why his current situation looks unusual. Such a player usually does not start the season without a club.
Belgium did not work out, other options too
One of the most notable overseas directions in the summer was Anderlecht.
Sport5 claims that the Belgian club twice tried to sign Hutsulyak. Previously, the player’s representatives confirmed interest from Belgium, but the transfer did not take place.
Various versions appeared around the possible deal, including the size of the salary and Anderlecht’s willingness to pay the required amount. The player’s agent, Oleh Avdysh, publicly denied some of these reports.
Therefore, the result is important here, not the rumors around the negotiations: Hutsulyak did not move to Belgium.
The transfer to Turkey or the Middle East also did not take place.
The market, which looked wide in the summer, became much narrower by October.
Unexpectedly, Polissya reappears
In early October, another option appeared in the story, which seemed almost impossible in the summer: returning to Zhytomyr.
Polissya’s head coach Ruslan Rotan was asked about the possible return of Hutsulyak. He did not close this possibility and made it clear that he is ready to work with the player again.
This is noteworthy also because Hutsulyak’s parting with the club was not easy. At the beginning of 2026, amid a dispute over the player’s new contract, he was transferred from the main team to the U-19 structure.
A few months ago, returning would have looked like a step back. Now it is already perceived as one of the real ways to quickly return to football.
At the same time, on October 6, Ukrainian sports resources reported that Hutsulyak is in Warsaw with his agent. The player’s temporary residence permit in Poland is coming to an end, so he needs to decide not only with the club but also with where he will be based next.
This everyday moment does not solve the player’s sports fate by itself, but it adds pressure to the time.
For Israel, not only Hutsulyak’s name is important here
An Israeli reader may quite rightly ask: why does Maccabi even need a footballer who has not played official matches for four months and at the same time wants a huge salary by local standards?
The answer lies in his level.
If Hutsulyak quickly regains form, Haifa will get a national team player without a transfer fee. On the market, a player of this level would usually cost several million euros even before discussing the salary.
But this is also a risk.
The club would have to invest a lot of money in a player who missed a significant part of the start of the season and then still wait for him to return to optimal condition.
For Maccabi, such a contract could become either a very successful deal or one of the most expensive staffing mistakes of the season.
Therefore, even after Sport5’s report, Haifa has no obvious reason to agree to all the player’s demands.
What has really changed since August
Two months ago, Hutsulyak could count on the next call bringing a better championship, a higher salary, or a more attractive club.
The next calls were there, but the contract did not happen.
Today, the player still has a strong resume, a place in the national team, and the ability to choose. But he has to choose from a smaller number of options and considering the time that works against him.
Israel, meanwhile, has not disappeared.
Moreover, according to Sport5, now Hutsulyak himself is ready to come here.
This does not mean that he will be at training in Kfar Galim — Maccabi Haifa’s training base located south of the city — tomorrow. Nor does it mean that the parties have already resumed full negotiations.
But the story, which in August could be considered closed, has become relevant again.
Now the question is not whether Oleksiy Hutsulyak will agree to Israel.
According to Sport5, he will agree.
The question is different: how much he is willing to concede for Israel to agree to him.