There is bad blood between Fenerbahçe and Trabzonspor, two former buddies, due to an unprecedented match-fixing scandal that erupted like wildfire last season. The Trabzonspor club contended that since three top Fenerbahçe officials were found guilty of match-rigging after the trial, the championship trophy should be taken from Fener and given to their team. And because the Turkish Football Federation (TFF) has all along turned a deaf ear to this request, the Black Sea side decided to undermine the TFF’s authority by declaring Trabzonspor the 2010-11 champion on its website last weekend.
Whether it was done wittingly or unwittingly, this declaration nonetheless helped fan the flame of hate ahead of Monday’s Fenerbahçe-Trabzonspor encounter.
However, common sense prevailed and there was no tension either in the stands or on the field. And this may be attributed to the fact that the match was played behind closed doors — with adult men banned, while women and children attended for free. Trabzonspor fans were also barred in accordance with a TFF ruling on away fans in matches played among the “Big Four” — Galatasaray, Fenerbahçe, Beşiktaş and Trabzonspor.
Plenty of misses
All in all, Monday’s match will not be remembered for fan rowdiness, pitch invasions or projectiles thrown onto the field — because none of these happened. However, it will be remembered for many years to come for the incredible misses by both teams, Fenerbahçe hitting the woodwork once and Trabzonspor twice.
Senegal striker Moussa Sow missed a clear chance in the fourth minute when he shot wide several meters from the goal after receiving a perfect pass from winger Gökhan Gönül. And a shot by captain-playmaker Alex de Souza from outside the Trabzon box in the 22nd hit the near post and rebounded into play.
A powerful shot taken by Trabzonspor’s Slovakia midfielder Marek Sapara in the 12th had hit the far post and gone out of play and Brazilian forward Paulo Henrique Carneiro Filho also hit the near post in the 86th.
But the real culprit — who missed the most on the night and maybe has gone into the record books for missed chances — was no other than Trabzonspor winger Olcan Adın. The 26-year-old Turkey international missed and missed throughout the match. But his two misses in the 80th and 83rd, with only Fenerbahçe keeper Volkan Demirel to beat, left everyone associated with Trabzon scratching their heads in disbelief.
“We dropped two vital points in a match we should have won,” Trabzonspor coach Şenol Güneş lamented after the match. “Adding the two points to the five we dropped before means we have dropped a total of seven [in five matches],” he noted. Monday’s result means Fenerbahçe has not been beaten at Kadıköy in 46 league matches over two-and-a-half years. However, calls for coach Aykut Kocaman’s head are growing louder, especially after the Yellow Canaries squandered a 2-0 lead to draw 2-2 with Olympique Marseille in their Europa League Group C clash in İstanbul last Thursday.
Kocaman strived to maintain his composure during the post-match news conference and tried to put the blame for the winless run on something else. “Monday’s performance was a result of the stress from the draw with Marseille,” he said. “Concentration was visibly lacking and this is something we must address,” he noted.
Fener remains one of the three undefeated teams in the league, but with the team trailing leader and archrival Galatasaray by four points, no one wants to listen to Kocaman’s excuses.
(Today’s Zaman)
