Genclerbirligi throw away vital points in Manisa

Akhisar fans went home happy. Gencler fans slumped away in anger and frustration as our coach failed to make the right changes and the referee then punished us badly.

Akhisar 3 - 3 Genclerbirligi

What a lovely autumn day for a walk down to the Yeni Sedir (my first time there) to join a dozen other Gencler fans for what promised to be quite a match. Last week Akhisar beat Trabzon 6-1 and Gencler beat Besiktas 2-1. So all was set and it was no surprise when Gencler played a very "sit back" role for the first 15 minutes.

We had hardly touched the ball when Ahmet Oguz sent a brilliant cross field ball up field to Serdar Ozkan who controlled it well and goal. Five minutes later and we were 2-0 up when Ugur Ciftci was in the right place at the right time.

Flying high and for some stupid reason Scekic tackled an Akhisar player from behind. Yellow card. Not long after there was a stupid mix up and after he failed to clear the ball ended up taking down an Akhisar player in the box. No card... but a penalty.

Things were still okay though as Vedat Muric scored with a unmarked header just before the half-time whistle.

Here comes the rantie bit (as in rant, not Rantie - who for some reason wasn't playing today).

It was very clear that we were going to face an Akhisar who came out and attacked in the second half and it was also very clear to the Gencler fans at the Yeni Sedir and was also noted by others on Whatsapp chat groups that Scekic had to be replaced. It was just too dangerous. He was on a yellow and had brought down a player in the box. Just one little bit of stupidity and he would be off.

Messut Bakkal wasn't listening.

Akhisar came out fired up and had a free kick in the 59th. The ball went into the box and someone fell over. Referee pointed to the spot and handed Scekic a second yellow. Replays show that it was a very harsh penalty. In fact there was no way in the world that it was a penalty. the penalty was converted.

So we had two things to scream at now. The referee and our own coach.

It was little surprise when Akhisar got another not long after and despite some heroic efforts we weren't able to score again.

We should have had that one.

Gencler are now in 16th place in the league but if we keep up the efforts of the last two weeks we should be able to get quite a bit higher. So, silver linings and all that stuff.