Ankaragucu confirms the Kankas designation ..... beshikTRASH !

Greetings Kankas and Kankies.

I shudder to think of the damage which Ankaragucu could have inflicted on Beshiktrash last night if they had all the 'leaves on the tree' available. As it is, with the few recognised 'leaves' remaining, Ankaragucu can be proud of their evening's efforts. All the players gave 100% and I only single-out Bora as Man of the Match due to his heroics between the sticks and getting up to clear potential danger from the 'giant' Ameida at corners and free kicks which saved a few certain goals.

Ankaragucu 0 Besiktas 0

Team -

Bora
Mehmet, Aydin, Umit and Ishak
Muhammed, Bilal, Abdullah and Gokhan
Keles and Turgut

Substitutes used - Mehmet, Atilla and Gurkan

Battle Damaged Kanka Damon and I met up at The Chopin and we were joined by Cider Kanka John and 'still no name kanka' Simon in the Stadium. Almost a full-house with Gecikondu and Maraton in fine voice pre and during the entire match.

Ankaragucu went for the early goal and were unlucky in the 8th minute when, first, Keles had a chance, and then from the ensuing corner, Turgut blasted over.

However, as the match settled down it was Beshiktrash looking the likelier team to score with Ankaragucu having problems getting out of their own half and defending desperately at times.

25 minutes in and the best chance of the match fell to Turgut who went on one of his mazy runs down the left wing, cut inside into the penalty box and let fly with a 'curver' which was heading for the top right hand corner. Unfortunately, Cenk made a world class save and touched the ball over for a corner.

Ankaragucu was being restricted to breakaway attacks, and from one of those, Keles scored a great 'offside goal' on the half hour mark. He was buzzing, but getting caught offside too often !

Approaching half time and a reflection of the 1st half was Bora dealing competently with everything thrown at him and the defence standing firm, although it has to be said ....... with a fair measure of luck !

Into the 2nd half and Bora was again the busiest player on the pitch. Almeida had been causing problems for most of the match with his head-flicks as he towered over the diminutive Ankaragucu defenders. Fortunately, Bora was able to deal with the high balls into Almeida who's fellow strikers were unable to feed off his good work.

Fernandes was causing all sorts of problems for the Ankaragucu defence with his probing runs and astute passing, and he came in for some stick from supporters above where we were in Maraton. On one occasion he was bombarded with plastic/metal cigarette lighters while taking a corner. Fortunately none connected, or if they did, he chose not to 'make a meal of it' and go down feigning injury which could have had serious repercussions !

65 minutes in and Keles scored his 2nd 'offside goal' but this time he also received a yellow for following through after the whistle !

5 minutes later and Beshiktrash almost made the break through from a well taken free kick, which was heading low into the bottom right hand corner, but Bora got down smartish to pull off another great save.

Into the final stages of the match and Ankaragucu was holding on desperately under extreme pressure from Beshiktrash, then .......... almost on the final whistle and a great chance came for a 'bent referee' to give Beshiktrash the 3 points when Edu made a spectacular swallow dive in the box from an innocuous tackle. Well done Mr Muftuoglu for giving that cheating 'bassa' an immediate yellow !!

So, another valuable point for the Ankaragucu 'B' Team who are now looking not a bad side, considering the haemorrhaging of players over the past 5 months. The burning question is though ............. can they hang on to Bora, Aydin, Turgut and Keles during the January Transfer Window ? If so, all is not lost me thinks !!

The next league match is away to mid-table Sivas on Sunday 15 January (probably the early KO) and it will be interesting to see if they play Rajnoch against his old club !

However, first up is the Cup match against Kasimpasa at home on Wednesday KO 6pm. This is another of those 'must win' matches to give Ankaragucu the chance to enter the group stage and earn some extra dosh for the Club !

All the best from Eski Kanka Jim