Maccabi Haifa crashed out of the Europa League after losing their final Group J fixture to Schalke.
The home side knew a win would guarantee their place in the last 32 of the competition regardless of the result between Steaua Bucharest and AEK Larnaca, who started the evening one point behind.
But they never recovered from going behind to Jurica Buljat’s own goal and, after Yaniv Katan’s 72nd-minute penalty was saved, late goals from Ciprian Marica and Andreas Wiegel sealed the win for Schalke.
That meant Steaua advanced to the knockout stage instead courtesy of a 3-1 win at home to AEK.