© Reuters 2002

TEL AVIV March 11 (Reuters) - Israel coach Richard Moller Nielsen has been given a two-year extension to his contract, officials said on Monday.

The Dane had been heavily criticised following his failure to take Israel to a World Cup playoff place last year.

"I feel that two years is not long enough to give a coach a chance to prove himself," Israel Football Association (IFA) chairman Gavri Levi said on Monday.

"It is true that the national team did not manage to qualify for the World Cup but we feel that he has done a good job."

Needing victory, Israel's World Cup hopes ended when they conceded an injury-time equaliser to Austria in their final qualifier in Tel Aviv last October.

Nielsen faced further scorn after the 7-1 trouncing by Germany in a friendly in Kaiserslautern last month. "I have received the offer, but I do not want to comment on it now," Nielsen, whose current two-year contract expires in June, told onefootball.com in a phone interview.

However, the Dane refused to say whether he would accept the new deal.

"We are having a training session on Wednesday and I will make my decision known then," Nielsen added. The IFA also offered under-21 coach Moshe Sinai a similar extension to his contract but Nielsen's assistant, Yitzhak Shum, is being made to choose between the national team and club soccer.

Shum, who has been assistant national coach for the past decade - working under his close friend Shlomo Scharf before staying on to help Nielsen - also began coaching second division Hapoel Kfar Sava at the end of last season.

His team currently top the standings with a huge lead and look certain to gain promotion to the premier league.