What happened in Turkish football today? 12/02/2019

Fenerbahce has shown great dominant game against Zenit and got small advantage in tie.

Fenerbahce has managed to get a win with minumum scoreline of 1:0 during Europa League 2nd round 1st leg game against Zenit with providing highly organised game with controlling and dominating game for 60 minutes and has shown signs that it will be taking Europa League with full seriousness and concentration.

It needs to be stated that great save from Harun Tekin from penalty kick at the end of the 1st half has also played an important role for this outcome during 1st leg game as if he could converted goal from that position it would been dissapointment as Fenerbahce has shown full dominance. It was also important for Islam Slimani to score a goal in such an important game and raise self-confidence and has also become one the star of the games which has been stated by Fenerbahce head coach Ersun Yanal during pre- press conference. It also needs to be noted that Fenerbahce without doubt has shown great team play at whole field until their become tired towards halfway of 2nd half. Another key player during game has been for sure Sadik Ciftpinar who has prevented Zenit player Artem Dzyuba to get into the game. Only negative aspect which can be taken towards this result, taking account that it 2-leg game is for Fenerbahce not finding more than 1 goal as Zenit could provide much more effective performance during 2nd leg in Saint Petersburg. Still, Fenerbahce should be satisfied with this performance.

Meanwhile, it needs to be noted that Zenit did provide unexpected poor performance not able to create any chances and losing simple possession of the ball which of course went  hand for Fenerbahce. Looking at their perspective their consider lucky to end game with such result, but of course defence has prevented Zenit to show good performance.

Fenerbahce has got an important score and didnt concede goal against difficult opponent but it needs to provide even better performance against Zenit as their might show better performance but Fenerbahce did show that it capable to get to last 16 stage.

Turkish Football Federation and Mircea Lucescu has ended partnership in mutual agreement.

Rumours about Turkish Football Federation planning to terminate contract with Turkish National Team head coach Mircea Lucescu has become partly true as both sides has ended partnership in mutual agreement.

During the statement, Mircea Lucescu has stated that he did come to this task with an aim to build younger side and has managed to do that as an average age of the team has been dropped from 29 to 23.5. It is true that Lucescu in that sense has done many works regarding with younger players and has brought them to the national team, and those players have some important experience for upcoming games for national team. But when taking account team has been relegated during inaugural season of Nations League from League B to C, and so didnt manage to get to the World Cup 2018 before that, it needs to be noted that Lucescu in this sense hasnt been successful. Stating that if new head coach, which expects to be current Besiktas head coach Senol Gunes who expects to be appointed after this season ends, would bring some good results with help of younger players, than a role by Mircea Lucescu needs to be accepted regardless how hard it would be. Turkish football right now, sadly, does have some lack of that level of performance which might be enough for ticket for Euro 2020 but their is potentiality in same time among players so new coach would need to focus to make this potentiality turn into result.

Right now, national team is without official coach and it would be expected that TFF would announce team new coach, permanently or until June, in upcoming days or at worst weeks, as its expectation that Tayfur Havutcu would be caretaker until June.

Referees need to improve their performance for last weeks.

Despite of introduction of VAR to Super League in this season which was expected to reduce criticism regarding of refereeing, 21st week has been mainly dominated from those decisions with Galatasaray - Trabzonspor, Kayserispor-Fenerbahce and other games.

Its important to note here that issue doesnt tend to be with VAR technology itself, since apart of Fenerbahce-Basaksehirspor earlier this season, it didnt provide much an issue at this aspect but seems to be done with human factor as some referees tend to make decisions either by themselves or even after checking VAR. As been mentioned at our blog, Trabzonspor didnt provide enough performance to beat Galatasaray due of respect, but their were many mistakes done by referee which couldnt be expected and during Kayserispor in similar manner , it is unlikely that Fenerbahce would have won that game taking account how their played but it could been ended with goalless draw. It does look that there important revisions needs to be done at Central Referee Committee including changes at the upper hand as their loss of trust by many clubs which could even raise high issues as we are entering to crucial weeks at the season and unless referees would be more fair and careful, those criticism would only raise.

Its important for referees to improve their performance as been mentioned if it doesnt want to lose its cridibility as important games would be coming at the league right now.

Results:
UEFA Europa League, 2nd round, 1st leg:
Fenerbahce 1:0 Zenit St. Petersburg

In other news:

- Galatasaray has recieved 20,000 TL fine for behaviour of fans from PFDK.

- PFDK referalls: 
- Kayserispor has been referred for behaviour of fans and allowing to game unallowed fans.
- Fenerbahce, Konyaspor and Trabzonspor has been referred for behaviour of fans and events at field
- Fenerbahce player Roberto Soldado has been referred for action
- Erzurumspor has been referred for not leaving stairs empty.
- Rizespor and Galatasaray has been referred for behaviour of fans.
- Goztepe has been referred for 6-players recieving yellow cards
- Ankaragucu has been referred for not leaving stairs empty.

- UEFA has announced that referee of Europa League 2nd round 1st leg game between Galatasaray and Benfica will be Jesus Gil Manzano

- Turkish National Team would play Euro 2020 qualifiers against France in Konya on 8th June at 21:45 and against Iceland in Reykjavik on 11th June at 21:45.

- CentralRefereeCommittee CEO Yusuf Namoglu has stated that he would resign from his post on 13th February after list of referees for this weekend will be done.

- Fenerbahce administrator Semih Ozsoy: We are going through difficult period as a club. We didnt expect it to be so hard, including economically. If I was club supporter, I would also criticise this performance.But we making honest statements.

- Galatasaray will have administrative meeting on 13th February.

- Basaksehirspor has announced that its started recovery process of its player Gael Clichy from injury.

- Fenerbahce player Tolgay Arslan has become injured prior to Europa League 2nd round 1st leg game against Zenit.

- Ankaragucu has stated that its player Yalcin Ayhan has started recovery of his injury with personal doctor.

- Besiktas considers to provide fine to its player Gokhan Tore who has stated at Twitter that he doesnt know why he is taken out of squad.

- Fenerbahce player Mehmet Ekici will not be able to play for 2-3 weeks due of injury.

- Galatasaray player Eren Derdiyok has stated that he still can be transferred to China as transfer window is still open there until end of month.

- Galatasaray doesnt plan to end contract with its player Younes Belhanda until end of the season.

- It is expected that assistant coaches for Senol Gunes at Turkish National Team will be Tamer Tuna and Seref Cicek.

- Fenerbahce has made transfer deal with Fortuna Dusseldorf player Amed Oncel for 500,000 euro and Borussia Monchengladblach for 1 million euro.