THE HEAVY WILL BE FLOWING!!

Congratulations to Eski Kanka Jimmy for Hibees superb 5-1 victory over the might of Kilmarnock yesterday. First trophy in his lifetime(?). Can we look forward to seeing the green machine in European action next season?

Good and bad on the road

Trabzon 0 - 1 Ankaragucu
Denizli 3 - 2 Genclerbirligi

What an absolutely weird day for sport. India all out against Bangladesh for a measly 191. Pakistan getting belted by the Irish bowlers, (I bet Ed Joyce wishes he had stayed with the Irish team), France win the Six Nations in the very last seconds of their match against Scotland, Ankaragucu win in Trabzon for the first time in more than 15 years (I think I heard that on the radio) and Gencler go down to second-last placed Denizli.

Okay, that last one wasn't so amazing Gencler are pretty good at losing games we have to win, but you get my drift.

In fact I'm so amazed at the results today that I'm going to nick an idea from The Guardian's coverage of the cricket today. Red Smith on Bobby Thompson's World Series winning home-run said: "There is no way to tell it. The art of fiction is dead: reality has strangled invention."

Sir Eski Kanka is in northern Britain at the moment, no doubt down the pub with Hibee Kanka, as he is off to go and see his beloved Hibernian playing in some mickey mouse final on Sunday. So I've been left with the duty of doing the reports for both of Ankara's teams.

So let's start off with the good news, Ankaragucu's win over Trabzonspor.

Started off well enough for Ankaragucu with Tita coming close in the third minute and it wasn't long after that Bebbe sent in a pass from the right to ex-Genclerbirligi captain Mustafa Ozkan who shot the ball past the Trabzon goalkeeper.

I won't go into too much more detail as the match stayed at that score but looking at the Anatolian news agency report the rest of the match was all Trabzonspor trying to get back in. Ceyhun (whom Ankaragucu sold at the winter break) and Ayman (whom Genclerbirligi sold at the winter break) both feature prominently in the report but obviously none of them scored.

So well done to Ankaragucu, a tough away match and they came up trumps. By the way I will edit this at some stage once I find out when exactly was the last time Ankaragucu won away to Trabzon.

Now onto the depressing news that Gencler lost.

Let me firstly point out that Galatasaray only managed a draw last night, as did Kayserispor today. A win would have put us into a great position in the fight for a Champion's League place. Instead, they blew it.

Back to normal for this blog's favourite player, Isaac Promise, who seems to have missed a couple of chances at the beginning of the match, then missed when one-on-one with the keeper towards the end of the first half.

Denizli scored at the death of the first half and then Promise made amends of sorts at the beginning of the second by sending a pass in to Engin who shot from 30 metres out to score. 1-1.

A couple more good chances to Gencler failed and then Mehmet Nas, he who has been playing well lately but who also seems to be prone to giving away silly fouls, brings down a Denizli player in the box. Penalty awarded and converted. 2-1

Then a bloke who seems to have gone missing in the last month or so decides to have a go, good old Mehmet Cakir scores for Gencler. 2-2

No real description of Denizli's third and winning goal in the Anadolu report, pretty much just that it happened. 3-2

Denizli had a player sent off at 80 minutes and the last 10 minutes, plus extra time, was all Gencler but no goal was to be found. Depressing.

It Couldn't Last!

After seeing Pompey soar(!) to the top of the Premiership earlier in the season, we're now struggling to find the next win. In fact, only one win since Boxing Day has rather put a dampener on our European aspirations for 2007/8. Still, the fans still remain upbeat about going on a "European tour", even if it is only Skonto Riga in the opening round of the Intertoto in early July, when most people are still thinking about going on their summer hols.

I managed to get to our game against Sheffield United in January, keeping up my record of having seen at least one game a season since being in Saudi from 1989. First away game for 8 years or so too. There is a special atmosphere when you follow your team away from home, at least certainly in England there is. Everyone sings, the beer flows (calm down Eski Jim) and most of us enjoy the day out even when we lose, which we didn't in this particular case.

4 of our last 5 home games have us up against Man Utd, Newcastle, Arsenal and Liverpool; what a run-in. At least, for the first time in 4 years, we're safe from relegation this time otherwise it really would be a miracle to escape this time. Staying up also puts us in a position to grab some of the bounty from Sky for next season, somewhere in the region of £30m if I recall correctly. Perhaps 'Arry Redknapp might be able to tempt some players that are under 35 years old to our humble ground?

I'm hoping to taste some Turkish delight sometime in July of this year, since my parents dumped beautiful Ingerlund for the (only just) sunnier climes of Koycegiz - apologies for the likely spelling mistake! All being well, Ankara could be a stop on my itinerary (how are you stocked for Efes Eski Jim?).

in the meantime, I'll be keeping my fingers crossed for a Pompey win on Saturday away to Reading - Play Up Pompey!

Hibs 2-0 Falkirk

Hibs warmed up for the CIS League cup final with a comfortable two nil victory over Falkirk.
Two goals from our Morrocan striker 'Benji' secured the three points that keep our faint hopes of a UEFA cup spot alive.
Hibs created all the early running and should have scored two or three goals without reply in the first half. A mixture of good defending and poor finishing meant the teams went in at halftime all square. It may have been all square in terms of goals (or lack of them) but in 'men on the park' Hibs had the advantage as Falkirks Holden was red carded.
Two goals early in the second half killed the game off as a contest, this at least gave Hibs an easier run out in preparation for the cup final this Sunday.
So it is in anticipation that all Hibs fans look towards Sunday, but before that big day the Edinburgh branch of the Kankas have the opportunity to see Sir Eski Kanka show off his refereeing skills.
Sir Eski has offered to referee Mini Hibbee Kankas school match on Saturday. He sounds a bit eager to brandish the red card in my opinion but we will see if he needs it.
I don't now if school children these days show the same respect that Sir Eski would have witnessed in the 1920's but I will have them on their best behaviour.
Some interesting stories and pictures to follow.

Hibbee Kanka

Everyone gets 5 seconds of fame

As promised I managed to record the clip of Little Oz Kanka Matthew on TRT3 last night. If you notice carefully just a little bit after Matthew you will see a little boy in his blue Italy shirt. None other than Little Nordic Kanka Bendik.

I cut the recording as soon as the match started as I didn't think you'd like to get too bored.

ANKARAGUCU - A GOLDEN OPPORTUNITY SQUANDERED

Greetings Kankas and Kankies.

More depressing news from the ANKARAGUCU camp………..

ANKARAGUCU 0 Besiktas 1

Maniac Kanka Harun was at the match but unfortunately he couldn't make it for post-match drinkies and reflections due to a domestic crisis.

Oz Kanka, Marash Kanka Hakan, Battle Hardened Kanka Damon and I watched the match in The Cappadokia Bar along with the usual crowd of Ankara residents who support Istanbul teams !

Oz Kanka saw most of the 1st half and he reported that it was all ANKARAGUCU with the Besiktas goalkeeper, Runje, in outstanding form. Abdurrahman, Petkov and Devran all went close and would have opened the scoring but for the heroics of Runje in goal. Ricardinho, Bobo and Nobre were all posted missing in the 1 st half with Serkan having little or nothing to do.

So, to half time and instead of the usual boring commercials we were `entertained` with the violent scenes in the Stadium. Missiles and pieces of ripped out plastic chairs were flying around and lots of people (including women) trying to escape for cover. A shameful sight and for seemingly no apparent reason.

The ambulance crews were kept busy and when the players returned to the field the `war` was still going on. Hikmet Karaman ran to the wire fencing to appeal for calm but the Police were hauling people over the fence and arresting the culprits. Eventually, calm was restored but lots of blood had been spilled and I'm sure recriminations will follow !

The Deputy Prime Minister, Abdullah Gul, and the Sports Minister, Mehmet Ali Sahin, were at the match and Mr Sahin is reported in Hurriyet as saying that harsh measures must be taken to stop these frightening scenes occurring at footie matches. The ANKARAGUCU Chairman, Cemal Aydin, on the other hand, was trying to play down the incident (obviously fearful of the Club being punished !!).

The Hurriyet also reported that the violence was started by ANKARAGUCU and Bursaspor (brother team) supporters, and if this is proved correct, then I'm sure we can expect the Club to be punished. It is not too long ago we reported in this Blog The Battle of Kayseri, and more recently, the Battle of Sakaryaspor !!

If ANKARAGUCU is found guilty then I think we can expect to play one or even two home matches behind closed doors !!

Back to footie, and the 2nd half resumed 10 minutes late with more pressure from ANKARAGUCU. However, it has to be said that Besiktas were coming more into the match although it was mostly all ANKARAGUCU.

Bebbe had a great chance to open the scoring on the 50th minute mark when he was put through with only Runje to beat. He shot, but the ball rebounded off Runje and into the path of Mustafa who had an open goal. He shot, but Runje miraculously stuck out his left foot in a reflex action and the ball was deflected out for a corner. Frustration? Absolutely !!

Yordanov came on near the end and almost scored with a volley which went whizzing past the post.

With 5 minutes to go it looked done and dusted 0-0. Then…………. Tragedy ! Delgado was put through with a pass from the half way line with the ANKARAGUCU defence sleeping. Serkan came out to narrow the angle but committed himself a fraction too soon allowing Delgado to slip the ball between him and the post.

Remember the old cliché………… the game ain't over till it's over ??!!

We all make mistakes and I'm sure Serkan will be squirming when he sees a re-run of the goal !!

So, back into the relegation zone and only 4 points ahead of 3rd bottom club Erciyes, and with an away match in Trabzon next Saturday the nerve ends are beginning to jangle again !!!

Perhaps we could offer some `inducements` to Trabzon to `rest` Umut and Ceyhun ??!!

All the best from Eski Kanka Jim

Matthew becoming a Gencler star

Not that I'm a media whore or anything, well... not much anyway. I thought I should inform everyone that I shall be on Tele Lig on TRT 3 on Tuesday night.

Tele Lig is a show which according to the TRT website concentrates on football outside of the big three Istanbul teams. Zeki Col is the man in charge of the show and apparently I appeared in the broadcast which went out tonight (Sunday).

I had no idea I was being featured but was alerted to the fact by a Genclerbirligi forum member by the name of Asuman (Flying Dutchman Kanka: this was the girl we gave the lift back from the Yenikent Stadium a few weeks ago) who described the clip as "tek kelimeyle MUHTEŞEMdi". Whatever that means.

Having said all that, I actually think the clip they showed was not of me ranting on about what an idiot Ilhan Cavcav is but was instead of young Matthew singing "kirmizi, siyah, en buyuk, Gencler". Typical, here I am an intelligent Gencler supporter with an opinion I want shared around the world and instead they go for the pretty young face.

The show starts at 11:30 pm Tuesday night (TRT 3). I'll try to see if I can get a recording and put it on here (not the whole show, just the important bits).