ANKARAGUCU - A POINT WELL MADE

Greetings Kankas and Kankies.

Trabzonspor 0 ANKARAGUCU 0

A trip to the Huseyin Avni Aker Stadium (even when it is empty) under normal circumstances would entail leaving empty-handed, such is the reputation of Trabzonspor at home. However, the present ANKARAGUCU team under Herr Briegel’s direction is beginning to take shape and it was therefore no surprise that a point was well earned last night. Indeed, in reality it could (and should) have been 3 points !

First up, the kankas met in The Cappadokia Bar to watch the match on the Big Screen. Maniac Kanka Harun, Yankee Kanka, Battle Damaged Kanka Damon, Rip-Off Kanka Erman and yours truly. By the way, we had to change Apple Kanka’s name since he has now left the Apple Company and joined Turkcell ! Can you imagine the name change if he had joined Turk Telekom ??!!
(Note – the name change was suggested by Battle Damaged Kanka and agreed unanimously !).

I said at the beginning of the match that Herr Briegel’s team formation was about right, ie, 4-4-2, and so it proved. We are all well aware of Trabzon’s strengths and weaknesses and one of their strengths is in midfield where Gokdeniz and Ceyhun can cause havoc if they take control and can feed Umut up front. It was therefore satisfying to see that, as the match progressed, both Gokdeniz and Ceyhun becoming frustrated by the ANKARAGUCU midfield players, epecially Kirita and Cem Can not giving an inch.

We can say that it was a match where most of the action occurred in the midfield area, but on the occasions when the teams had sight of goal, the goalkeepers were rarely in action, except to take goal kicks or receive back passes. Most of Trabzon’s goal attempts came from long range efforts from Gokdeniz all of which went flying over the bar. At the other end, Kirita and Bebbe had fine efforts which went narrowly past both posts. Bebbe did score a great goal just before half time when he back-heeled in a cheeky goal with Tolga looking over his shoulder in despair. Unfortunately for ANKARAGUCU the linesman was right up with play and rightly ruled the goal out for offside. C’est la vie !

Using Steve McLaren’s vocabulary, I will take the `positives` from the match. ANKARAGUCU played some nice one touch footie and their build-up was generally very good. However, the old failing came back with the final pass or the shot on goal not up to standard. Also, I was pleased to see the team playing for the full 90 minutes as they did so well against CimBom a few weeks ago.

I suppose we could label the match a cat and mouse affair with both team fairly even. However, I have to say that ANKARAGUCU had Trabzon rocking in the last 10 minutes with a final attacking onslaught. Kirita and Bebbe both went close with long range strikes and the impressive Murat Erdogan (recently arrived from Sakaryaspor) who had come on half way through the 2nd half, had a near miss with another long range shot.

Jaba came on with 5 minutes remaining and showed some nice touches. I expect to see him playing up front on a regular basis with Bebbe and Dursun very soon.

Man of the match for me was captain Emre who snuffed out everything that came his way. In fact, he frustrated our `old boy` Umut so much that Umut was substituted with 20 minutes of the match remaining. Were those tears I saw cascading down Umut’s cheeks as he trudged off ??!!

I should also mention El Yasa who put in a good shift alongside Emre, and was also seen attacking from time to time. Bebbe, as usual, never stopped running and tracking back when necessary. All things considered then, a good team performance which on any other day might well have been a 3 pointer for ANKARAGUCU.

It was back to The Cappadokia Bar to join us for the Gencler Kankas after their match against Manisa. Lots of long faces and mutterings of discontent from them, but that is Oz Kanka’s story in the previous post.

Looking forward to the next match then and ANKARAGUCU will be at home next Friday night 21st September against Istanbul BBS with a KO of 8.30pm. Meeting at The Chopin Bar from 5.30pm onwards and going to the Stadium at about 7pm.

If Herr Briegel is reading our Blog then I suggest a 4-3-3 formation !!!

All the best from Eski Kanka Jim