A FEELING OF DEJA VU !

Greetings Kankas and Kankies.

It was just like the 'good olde days', or if you prefer, the 'bad olde days' circa 1999 when Eski was the ONLY Kanka ! The only difference was that I was in The Beer Bus Bar and not in Sahil !

A plea ..... come back Martyn, Robbie, Jamie and Steve !!!

Ooooops, I almost forgot as I was drowning in nostalgia ...... to the match, and as Oz said in the previous post .......

ANKARAGUCU 1 Buca 1

I have to say that Ankaragucu can consider themselves rather fortunate to be still in the mix for qualification. Even allowing for the fact that most of the 'star players' were absent, it was a shocking display from Ankaragucu (apart from Bora and Rajnoch).

As Nadeem mentioned in the comments of a post 1 or 2 back, lots of new faces in the line-up -

Bora
Ugur, Rajnoch, Zewlakow, Murat
Gabric, Adem, Weeks, Ozgur
Metin and Serdar

2nd half substitutes - Mehmet, Ergin and Muhammed

I was surprised at the turn-out for a Monday late KO match. All 5 Tribunes were well represented and 'noisy'. I was with some of my old buddies from Pegasus in Maraton, and Roger the Dodger Kanka joined me 15 minutes into the match.

The match started at a frantic pace with Buca on the back foot and Ankaragucu looking to nick the early goal. It almost came 14 minutes in when Serdar had a great chance after a defensive mix-up, but it was cleared before he could react.

Bora was called into action for the first time on 15 minutes with Buca gradually coming into the match and looking dangerous.

Then on the half hour mark Buca put two great moves together. The first was well saved by Bora, but the second a few minutes later was a clinical goal fashioned by the cut-back to the unmkarked Musa lurking on the edge of the penalty box, and he gave Bora no chance with a screamer of a shot.

Cue..... Eski shaking his head in disbelief and reaching for his optimism pills !

Approaching half time and against the run of play, Ankaragucu found the equaliser. A corner slung over and there was Man of the Match Rajnoch powering in to send a great header in - in hindsight he was the only player who was likely to score !

Into the 2nd half and Zewy almost made the break-through on 56 minutes with a great header which rebounded off the bar and was cleared.

Buca was beginning to take control of the match now and playing some delightful passing moves which had the Ankaragucu defence in panic stations at times. Another feeling of deja vu with the defenders hoofing it anywhere instead of trying to bring it out !

Buca almost scored the winner on 66 minutes when the Ankaragucu defence was left for dead and the attacker somehow contrived to miss an open goal thanks to a last minute goal-line clearance from (couldn't see).

It was all Buca now and Bora pulled off a few excellent saves as the clocked ticked down to the end of the match.

A feeling of relief then, rather than disappointment !

As Oz said in the previous post, it is all in the hands of Ankaragucu and Gencler to go out and WIN their last match of the group stage.

That should be another nail biting 90 minutes on the 27th January in The Beer Bus Bar !!

All the best from Eski Kanka Jim