Sunday, December 29, 2019

ANKARAGUCU MAKE HEAVY WEATHER OF SECURING ONE POINT !




Greetings Kankas and Kankies.

Yet another of those matches of two halves with an impressive fight back by Ankaragucu in the 2nd half after huffing and puffing their way through the 1st half against 10 men.

It was a frustrating 1st half with Ankaragucu doing everything but put the ball between the sticks, so it wasn’t really a surprise that Denizli went in 2-0 up at half time with their only 2 serious attempts on goal.

ANKARAGUCU        2                Denizlispor         2

Team – Korcan, Cebrail, Alihan, Pazdan, Pinto, Sedat, Faty, Kitsiou, Canteros, Ilhan and Orgill

Substitutes – Scarione, Zaur and Aydin





The kankas assembled in the Metro AVM Cafe near the Eryaman Stadium – Maniac Kanka Harun, Battle Damaged Kanka Damon, Posh Kanka Ahmet, Kenan and Nurer.



The match exploded into life in the 10th minute when Barrow received a straight red card for a high tackle into Cebrail’s head.   Fortunately, Cebrail was able to continue after treatment.

Denizli then sneaked a goal in the 22nd minute and Korcan and his defenders must shoulder the blame for not defending the 6 yard box which is the goalkeeper’s domain.   A free kick was awarded to Denizli on the right touchline and the ball was crossed into the danger area.   Korcan stupidly stayed on his line instead of attacking the ball and Mustafa bulleted a header in to shock us all.   Korcan’s first real touch of the ball was to retrieve it from the net  !

That should have been a wake-up call for Ankaragucu, but Orgill and Ilhan both missed good chances to equalise.

Pazdan came to the rescue on the half hour mark with a timely interception to save a certain goal after some sloppy play from Ankaragucu in midfield.

Then, on the half time whistle came a reprise of the first goal from a cross on the right.   Again the ball was sent into the danger area and again Korcan stayed on his line.   This time it was Rodallega who bulleted in a header with Korcan stationary.      Aaaaaargh, terrible defending   !!!

The 2nd half revival started with the introduction of Man of the Match, Scarione, for Alihan 10 minutes in.   He took the match by the scruff of the neck and showed his team mates how it should be done  !    God knows what the score would have been if  he had started the match, however, we Ankaragucu supporters are thankful for small mercies  !!

Prior to his first goal, Kitsiou had two chances and Orgill one chance to score but both blasted over and wide to increase our frustration.



At last, Scarione’s great play was rewarded in the 66th minute when he went on a mazy run on the left, weaving his way past tackles, and shot into the bottom right for an outstanding individual goal.

10 minutes later and a huge sigh of relief when Pazdan made an uncharacteristic mistake to gift the ball to a Denizli attacker.   He bore down on goal one-on-one with Korcan who came rushing out to narrow the angle and his shot went just past the right post.

10 minutes to go and again Kitsiou was ideally placed to find the equaliser but he fired past when it was easier to find the target.

However, 3 minutes later and Scarione again showed his class by firing in a great shot to the top right with the goalkeeper well beaten.

Cue ........volume up ............ as Ankaragucu searched for an unlikely winner which didn’t materialise, but again Ankaragucu showed their fighting spirit to snatch a precious point.

So, despite some heroics in the past few weeks, Ankaragucu is still rooted to 2nd bottom position in the league, but it is still very tight at the bottom with 6 Clubs within touching distance of each other.

With the transfer ban still in place, it is going to be a tense 2nd half of the season.   The one worrying aspect is we must hope and pray that Ankaragucu can still pay their existing players their salaries, and also be mindful of other Clubs hovering over their players in the January transfer window.

If Ankaragucu can retain all their players, then we can at least be hopeful of the team moving out of the relegation zone at some point.

First up during the weekend of 18/19 January is a home match against fellow strugglers Konya and that most definitely falls into the category of a ........ must win match !

Keep watching this space for updates.

In the meantime, a Happy New Year to all footie fanatics who follow our reports on this blog.

All the best from Eski Kanka Jim

3 comments:

  1. Well done Jimbo 💙💛💙

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  2. Great comeback again from Ankaragücü as the players just never give up. The two goals we gave away were very poor and could have been avoided.

    Now it’s onto the January transfer window, the board are still working hard to lift it and the media are reporting that we want Tyler Boyd and Younes Mokhtar. Other reports claim Dever Orgill wants a move away from the club

    Happy new year Kankas

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  3. If the transfer ban is lifted before the end of the season I will start supporting Osmanlispor ............ that's how confident I am that we are going ....... nowhere !!!!

    ReplyDelete