Jon Pacheco and Sergio Gomez struck for La Real before Dor Turgemann scored a late consolation for Maccabi Tel Aviv. Maccabi also had Osher Davida sent off.
Afterwards, Imanol admitted the tie was a must-win for his players. He said, “It was very important to win this match, it was the main objective. We have achieved victory in Europe, which is always difficult.
"The problem is that, after being so clear dominators and superior, especially in the first half, we should have killed the match, finished it off, but if we let them live in Europe, anyone can give you a scare, all teams take risks and what happened today can happen…
"We have played well in these last few games because I decided to make so many changes and give value to all the players. Surely that is why the results are coming now. I think that against Anderlecht, or Nice in the second half, even the day of Madrid, we also played a game that we should have won, but we didn't get it right.”
Imanol added, “It bothers me that when we are superior we are showing that we are not a team capable of killing off games, or even creating more chances, because we should have done a lot more, and it is something that we have to improve, because we are not always going to be superior to our opponents for 90 minutes. We have to learn. Now we are reaping victories and good play, and I think it has to do with those moments.”