Turkey’s topsy-turvy season

FFT heads to Istanbul, where the league is upside down

Turkish football’s reputation for being bonkers is well founded. This season, unheralded new boys Istanbul Basaksehir are surging towards a first league title, while 19-time champions Fenerbahce are battling to avoid relegation. And, of course, Robinho’s at the heart of it all

Even for Fourfourtwo, this is a first. We are on the western outskirts of Istanbul and have just been threatened with a stadium ban by Gael Clichy. FFT has been watching the Premier League winner practise alone in the Saturday afternoon sun, a few hundred yards from Istanbul Basaksehir’s Fatih Terim Stadium. As the 33-year-old jogs up and down the training field, curiosity gets the better of him and he wanders over to find out exactly who we are. “Ah, you’re from England!” he says, happy to have a visitor from the country where he spent 14 years playing for Arsenal and Manchester City. “I hope you’ll be our lucky charm today. If not, access denied forever!” The manic laughter that follows suggests that we needn’t worry.

We’re here to see Istanbul Basaksehir host Fenerbahce, in a season when Turkish football’s natural order has been turned upside down. Founded as recently as 2014, Basaksehir are on course to be crowned Turkish champions. A dominant force for decades, Fenerbahce are somehow battling relegation.

The intrigue doesn’t stop there, either: both squads are packed with former Premier League talent. Fenerbahce have Martin Skrtel, Victor Moses, Roberto Soldado, Andre Ayew, Mauricio Isla and Islam Slimani; Basaksehir have Clichy, Robinho, Emmanuel Adebayor, Demba Ba and Emre Belozoglu, as well as Barcelona loanee Arda Turan. Give it a couple of years, and it’s a veterans’ six-a-side game waiting to happen.

Clichy won’t line up for the hosts today - he’s doing fitness work as he recovers from injury – so we leave him to his running and head into the stadium where Basaksehir’s media officer, Coskun Gulbahar, is keen to show us around.

We’ve travelled 15 miles from the banks of the Bosphorus, traversing the full length of two metro lines to reach the Basaksehir district. Compared to the maddening traffic chaos of central Istanbul, we’re greeted by the peace and quiet of suburbia, plus a 17,000-capacity arena with space age curving floodlights. The interior is impressive too, featuring separate prayer areas for Muslims, Christians and Jews, and personalised player screens above each peg in the home dressing room, just in case Robinho & Co. get lost trying to find their spot.

Basaksehir aren’t exactly shy about showing off their stars: visiting players enter the ground through a walkway lined with lifesize cardboard cutouts of Adebayor, Emre and friends. By the players’ tunnel, there’s a giant mural of an owl flying off with the Champions League trophy between its talons. Nicknamed ‘Baykus’ (‘Owls’), Basaksehir are openly ambitious.

“We hope to write history this season,” says Gulbahar. “In the last 60 or 70 years, only five teams have become the champions of Turkey: Besiktas, Galatasaray, Fenerbahce, Trabzonspor and Bursaspor. We will be the sixth.”

“TURKEY’S MOST FAMOUS CLUBS ARE MANAGED BY ELECTIONS AND CHANGE TOO MUCH. OUR MODEL’S DIFFERENT”

Basaksehir were formed five years ago after the closure of Istanbul Buyuksehir Belediyesi, which translates rather boringly as ‘Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality’. Themselves only formed in 1990, Istanbul BB were owned by the local authorities and rose to the top flight in 2007 under coach Abdullah Avci. Playing in front of tiny attendances at the 76,000-capacity Ataturk Stadium, where Liverpool won the 2005 Champions League Final, they went on to finish 6th in the Turkish Super Lig. Relegation followed in 2013 after Avci departed for an ill-fated spell in charge of the national team, and the club hit a downturn under Carlos Carvalhal.

Istanbul BB bounced back a year later, but by then the local authorities had decided they were no longer willing to fund the team. The club were privatised and moved a couple of miles north-east to Basaksehir and the newly built Fatih Terim Stadium – named after the then-turkey boss, a national hero.

Retaining several of Istanbul BB’S players, Basaksehir swiftly brought Avci back as coach and finished 4th in the top flight in their first season, qualifying for a Europa League place. Sometimes known as Medipol Basaksehir as part of a sponsorship deal, they were surprise title contenders in 2016-17, eventually fading as Besiktas claimed top spot.

By then they’d already recruited the ageing Emre, surplus to requirements at Fenerbahce, and Adebayor, without a club after departing Crystal Palace. Arda Turan followed, looking to revive his career after an unsuccessful stint at Barcelona and an incident when he reportedly had to be restrained from throttling a reporter on a flight home from a Turkey match.

Basaksehir briefly led the standings again last season and still harboured hopes of taking the title on the final day, only to finish 3rd. Beaten by Burnley in Europa League qualifying this term, they’ve lost only twice in the league all season ahead of tonight’s Fenerbahce tussle. They lead the Turkish Super Lig by eight points from Galatasaray, with Besiktas a distant 3rd.

Inside Basaksehir, there’s a feeling that this could be the year. They may be new kids on the block in Turkish football terms, but they’re not short of old heads: Demba Ba is 33, while Robinho and Adebayor are both 35 and Emre is still pulling the midfield strings at 38.

Despite those star names and their league position, media interest is still low compared to Istanbul’s traditional big three clubs. “If a newspaper puts our picture on their front page, not many people will look at it,” admits Gulbahar. “Fenerbahce are struggling, but I’ll open the newspaper and still see a picture of Fenerbahce. That means there’s less pressure on us, though.”

The lack of coverage is due to Basaksehir’s lack of fans – they didn’t take a single one to Turf Moor in August. A new club in a newly built district of Istanbul, they’re realistic that most football lovers in the area have already pledged their allegiance to another team.

“In our first season in 2014, we sold 400 season tickets,” explains Gulbahar. “Nobody supported Istanbul BB because it was the municipality team, so there was no emotion about it. Now we’re Basaksehir and hoping to win the emotion of people living in Basaksehir.

“We visit schools with players like Adebayor, trying to win the children of six or seven years old. When they get to 10 or 15, it’s too difficult to change the team they support. This year we have sold more than 4,000 season tickets and our average attendance is 5,000 to 6,000.

“We have to be successful to keep winning new fans,” continues Gulbahar. “If we reached the Champions League and played someone like Barcelona, the stadium would be packed. Lionel Messi has never played in Istanbul, and people would want to watch him.”

FFT pops down the road to the club’s official Baykus cafe, to meet the leaders of the main fan group. “We went to watch some Istanbul BB matches, but just as a hobby,” explains Burak Bilgili. “However, when the club became Istanbul Basaksehir, the neighborhood we live in, we became real supporters of the club and it became a lifestyle.”

Huseyin Avcilar has even switched allegiance. “I supported Galatasaray,” he says. “I learned about fan culture there, but when Basaksehir was founded, I came to them and said, ‘I’m a Galatasaray tribune leader, but I’ve lived in Basaksehir for 20 years and want to establish a fan culture here’.”

With a noticeably young fanbase, there’s none of the intimidation factor that visitors might find at other Istanbul clubs. “If a fan of a rival team comes here, we drink with them and welcome them as a guests,” says Avcilar.

Indeed, as the calls to prayer from the local mosque can be overheard in the background, Basaksehir and Fenerbahce fans are mixing freely outside the stadium ahead of today’s game. While it’s technically an Istanbul derby, it has none of the heated rivalry that years of history might generate.

The current league table has thrown up some interesting quirks: Basaksehir’s contenders for the title are Galatasaray, the club managed by Fatih Terim, whose name is emblazoned across Basaksehir’s ground. Gala are also Fenerbahce’s fiercest foes. “I’d prefer Basaksehir to win the league than Galatasaray,” admits Fener fan Atakan Ozguner. “We want to win today, but the result of this game is complicated for us.”

Fenerbahce’s main focus is not Galatasaray or Basaksehir, but saving their own disastrous season. In the 60-year history of the Turkish Super Lig, none of Fener, Galatasaray and Besiktas have ever finished lower than 11th. Today, Fenerbahce sit 14th, just two points above the relegation zone. For a club with 19 league titles, nose-diving into the second tier would be unthinkable. “It’s the worst season I’ve ever experienced,” laments 49-year-old supporter Baris Topkaya.

There was huge optimism over the summer when fans voted in Ali Koc as the club’s new president, ousting Aziz Yildirim after 20 years at the helm. Koc outlined his plans to reduce the club’s eye-watering €621 million debt and made sweeping changes, luring Phillip Cocu from PSV Eindhoven as coach and recruiting Damien Comolli as director of football. The Frenchman had previously held similar roles at Tottenham and Liverpool.

“Ali Koc is one of the richest guys in Turkey and a devoted Fenerbahce fan – everybody loves him,” says Topkaya. “When Cocu arrived, everyone thought, ‘He won three titles at PSV, it will be good’. But many changes were made at once and a lot of the decisions were wrong.

“None of the fans like Comolli, because the pre-season signings were really bad. Slimani and Ayew seemed like nice signings from the Premier League, but they provide nothing. We sold our two star players, Giuliano and Souza, for €30m and then spent it on crappy players. They created a very bad team.”

After finishing 2nd last season, Fenerbahce lost three of their four opening matches this term to teams they were expected to beat with ease – Yeni Malatyaspor, Goztepe and Kayserispor. Following a 3-1 home defeat to Ankaragucu in October, Fener were 15th and Cocu was sacked. And things got even worse when Cocu’s former assistant Erwin Koeman, brother of Ronald, was put in caretaker charge and they sunk to 17th of the 18-team league.

They’ve climbed out of the relegation zone since the reappointment of Ersun Yanal, the coach who guided Fener to their last league title in 2014, and fans are at least confident that their team won’t fall into the second tier.

“No chance,” says Topkaya. “Everyone knows they f**ked up in pre-season, but the manager has changed now and the January transfers have been quite good. Victor Moses has come in from Chelsea and played well. The fanbase has come together, too. In the last six years, our average attendance has been 25,000. In our worst season, it’s 40,000.”

Not that there hasn’t been any anger. When Fenerbahce drew 0-0 at home to Basaksehir in

“In 60 YEARS, ONLY FIVE TEAMS HAVE BEEN TURKISH CHAMPIONS – BASAKSEHIR WILL BE THE SIXTH”

October, thousands of irate fans refused to leave the stadium, calling for the resignations of Cocu and Comolli. After a 3-0 December loss at Akhisarspor, the squad travelled home by bus rather than flying as scheduled, amid fears they might be confronted by supporters at the airport.

While Fenerbahce’s struggles have been the perfect illustration of the topsy-turvy nature of Turkish football right now, Basaksehir’s rise to top spot has not been well received by fans of the country’s powerhouse clubs. Some perceive them to be the team of all-powerful president Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the nation’s leader since 2003 but not always universally popular, having overcome an attempted coup in 2016.

A big football enthusiast who was reportedly offered a playing contract with Fenerbahce in his younger days, Erdogan was president of Basaksehir’s forerunners Istanbul BB during his time as city mayor, and scored a hat-trick during a celebrity game at the official opening of Basaksehir’s new stadium. His face adorns posters everywhere you look in Istanbul, and he has publicly expressed his happiness about Basaksehir’s strong season.

“This is totally different to when Leicester won the Premier League,” explains Fener fan Topkaya. “Leicester were appreciated by fans of other teams. It’s not like that here. Nobody is happy about Basaksehir’s success.

“The perception is that they’re a project team founded by the president and the municipality. Fenerbahce, Besiktas and Galatasaray all have millions of followers, so gaining control of those clubs is very difficult.

“One of Erdogan’s rare defeats was in the Fenerbahce elections. He had backed one of the candidates, but they got only a third of the vote and Aziz Yildirim won nearly 70 per cent. Some people think that because they can’t get Fenerbahce, Besiktas or Galatasaray, they are trying to control football through Basaksehir. The perception is it’s not a fair competition.”

FFT heads back into the stadium to speak to Basaksehir’s chief executive Mustafa Erogut, who’s keen to address the suggestions of links to Erdogan. “There’s no connection with the president, like the perception,” states Erogut. “We have our roots from Istanbul BB and he was involved then as he likes football – that’s why people connect us with the government. However, the government have no shares in the new club. There’s no relationship.”

Erogut attributes Basaksehir’s success this season to a business model that differs from Turkey’s most famous teams. “Many clubs are managed by elections, so they have too many changes,” he says. “We have no elections and presidential changes – just eight shareholders. We want sustainable success and plan for the long term. On the first day we started in 2014, our plan was to be in the Europa League in five years and the Champions League in eight. We wanted to become league champions too, and we’re going a lot faster than expected. In any industry, when the market isn’t operating very efficiently and you have a good model, you can rise quicker than you expected.

“Our budget is actually a third of Fenerbahce and Galatasaray but we can succeed because of our manager, Abdullah Avci,” adds Erogut. “Every other club has tried to hire him, but he chooses to stay here.”

Basaksehir have received architectural advice from Manchester City over plans for a major expansion of their training facility – the designs look akin to a small scale version of City’s own Etihad Campus. Hoping to emulate the English club’s rise, Basaksehir have three former City players in their ranks, with Robinho arriving in January to join Clichy and Adebayor.

“Robinho played against us for Sivasspor, a mid-table club, and heard that I had a shirt collection,” says Erogut, perusing the jerseys on his office wall signed by Messi, Neymar and Zinedine Zidane. “He brought me his shirt and said, ‘Please take this, now when are you taking me?’ I said, ‘What?!’ It started with a joke and became a reality!”

With kick-off approaching, FFT watches two eight-foot owls bumble through the stadium’s swish reception area, ready to perform mascot duties for the evening.

We head to the stand, where the PA system is treating us to the loudest pre-match music we’ve ever heard. The deafening techno tunes are probably an attempt to add atmosphere to a stadium that will be little more than half full, even for a match as big as this.

Every time the music goes quiet, the 1,000 Fenerbahce fans in the ground begin to sing and bounce – they could have brought more supporters but Basaksehir limited the away allocation, wary of losing home advantage.

One end of the stadium is completely empty, while Basaksehir’s ultras are positioned in the top tier on the far side. They’re nowhere near as loud as the Fenerbahce fans, but they have a drum and they’re doing their best.

With Galatasaray not in action until Monday, Basaksehir can move 11 points clear tonight and they’re ahead after 18 minutes. Former Turkey goalkeeper Volkan Demirel can’t clear a left-wing cross and the ball drops for Robinho to swivel and smash into the roof of the net.

Roberto Soldado soon has an opportunity to equalise but larrups his effort into the top tier behind the goal, displaying exactly the sort of finishing that Spurs fans endured on a regular basis. Many of the journalists in the press box are Fenerbahce fans, and one bashes the desk in frustration whenever a pass goes astray.

Basaksehir are playing functional rather than spectacular football – they already have six 1-0 wins under their belt this season, and they could be on course for another. “Fenerbahce have been bad,” is the half-time view of Senad Ok, writing for the Milliyet national newspaper.

There has been little for the Fenerbahce fans to shout about but that’s not stopping them, bouncing up and down as the game resumes. They are apoplectic when a penalty appeal is waved away by referee Huseyin Gocek – as are numerous Fener supporters who’ve snapped up tickets in the main stand and are too frustrated to remain incognito any longer.

With 17 minutes to go, they’re on their feet in joy as Soldado latches onto a poor backpass and flicks the ball over goalkeeper Mert Gunok to make it 1-1. It’s only the Spanish forward’s third league goal of the season.

But all that does is set the game up for a big finish: in the 83rd minute, Basaksehir’s Brazilian midfielder Mossoro darts into the penalty area and pokes the ball goalwards, allowing Italian substitute Stefano Napoleoni to score. After a two-minute VAR review for offside, the goal is given, sparking jubilant scenes around the stadium. Now it’s the Basaksehir ultras who are jumping around and doing the Poznan – there’s no shortage of atmosphere any more.

Fenerbahce withdraw ex-france midfielder Mathieu Valbuena through injury, barely 15 minutes after he’d appeared to wince in pain when he sprinted on as a substitute, while the hosts bring on Adebayor to help see the game out. The Togolese forward does just that, and arms are raised at full-time as Basaksehir seal a 2-1 win. Eleven points clear at the top, they are now within touching distance of the title.

There’s a stunned silence among the Fener fans, their nightmare season continuing with relegation still not out of the question. Down in the mixed zone, visiting players begin to file through and board the team bus. Martin Skrtel and Victor Moses play deaf and keep walking when FFT asks them if they’ll stop to talk. It’s understandable: they’re not really in the mood.

Basaksehir players are far happier: they can be heard singing in celebration in the dressing room before emerging together, still chanting. Robinho gives FFT a friendly thumbs up, child in arms, before Adebayor finds time for a chat.

“Everyone is happy, as you can see,” he tells us. “The atmosphere around the whole club is so good. It’s been unbelievable since I came here. I didn’t have a club at the time, but they trusted me from day one. That’s why I always give 100 per cent whenever they call on me, even if I only play 10 minutes like today.”

Adebayor has represented Arsenal, Man City and Real Madrid, but never won a league title. “I’ve been so close so many times – I want to win this league so badly,” he says. “Now we have to finish the job. We’re 11 points clear. Everything is in our hands. Three or four more wins in a row and I think we’ll be champions.”

At 35, it could potentially be the final act of Adebayor’s high-profile career. For his club, it might be just the beginning. With Fenerbahce floundering near the bottom and Basaksehir beating all and sundry at the top, this is one season that no one in Turkey is likely to forget.