Sunday, August 27, 2006

Missed chance

Contrary to suggestions in some comments, I missed Saturday's game for a somewhat more mundane reason, traffic!!!!!

The Husband and I had been shopping at IKEA (dont laugh too hard) and on the way back on I-78 past Newark the road splits into tow sections, local lanes and express lanes. At the moment the express lanes are being replaced and this leaves only the local lanes for all the well trained and skilled New Jersey morons I mean drivers to use. This is a challenge to your average NJ driver. Now I dont wish to generalize but your average NJ driver is at least 50lbs overweight, drives a large SUV which of course can be driven whilst drinking coffee, chatting on the cell, changing the DVD for the kids and fixing the make up round your piggy fat eyes!!! All this at 80-mph and 3 ft from the car in front.

I guess you get the picture. Of course it rained heavily for the frirst time yesterday turning the road surface into a slippery mixture of rubber, diesel and dust with all the grip of ice. And of course there was an accident which with the tow trucks, cops etc. caused the road to be blocked for just long enough for me to get home after the match finished!

Not that I missed much by the looks of it. At least we have not lost yet but the team will have to get organised and stop giving up goals the way they are. The only good bit of news was that the Kadikoy Mob lost to Sakaryaspor so the gap is only 3 points after 4 matches.

I watched the Chelski game today. Is it me or is Muchael Essien immune from punishment???? and as for the penalty that was ironic given that John Terry was a victim of the Terry method of defending, called the otopus!!!

Now we have a break for EURO qualification, how bizzare...total contempt displayed by UEFA for the average fan, nothing new there then....

Friday, August 25, 2006

Dohhhhhhhhh!!!!!!

Sometimes I can hardly understand why I support Galatasaray, or more precisel;y the intelligent, informed football fans who control the finances and club..... what have they done you ask, well nothing other than give up the biggest advantage we have when playing in Europe

ALI SAMI YEN.......


Are Liverpool going to play at Wembley are Man Utd going to play in Leeds, no so why on earth are Galatasaray going to play at the Olympic Stadium which has all the atmosphere and intimidation of a graveyard!!!!!

I can only think this is a cynical attempt by the management to earn maximum gate receipts but what about making sure we use our greta strength, the crowd and the atmosphere at Ali Sami Yen to get us through a group which it is possible to get through and then progress further.

Of course I may be missing something and our stadium is not fit for European games and if thats the case then there is no choice, but of its purely financial then shame on you Canaydin.

Thursday, August 24, 2006

Scouse....a new dish

I am sure that all of you out there know the origins of the word scouse as used to describe those likeable witty rogues from Liverpool. Basically it is a stew of meat, vegetables and ships bicuits....sounds lovely.

So after tonights Chimps league draw we will start with a dish of scouse, washed down with fine red wine and finishing off with Dutch Cheese!!!!! And who said there was no taste in football.

To translate Galatasaray were drawn with:

Liverpool
PSV Eindhoven
Girodins Bordeaux

Not too bad really. Could have been alot worse if we had been drawn in the Barca Chelsea group and thankfully domestic harmony was not threatened as we avoided Man Utd!!

First match is 12 September against Bordeaux at Ali Sami Yen............

And on Saturday its Gaziantep at home....

Congratulations to Tranzonspor and Kayseri who made it through to the next round of the UEFA Cup.

Wednesday, August 23, 2006

Painless passage

At last Galatasaray managed to give me the chance to watch a game without getting totally stressed. A simple 1-1 draw played without difficulty got us through to the league stage of the Champions League. Meybe now we can earn some money to clear the debts and finish the stadium. I guess this also seals Ilic for the season.

Of course I am happy that the other Istanbul team did not qualify, a 2-2 draw at home against Kiev being totally not enough after losing the away game 3-1. On the other hand its now down to CimBom (as usual as Fenerbahce for all their money and mouth have never realy achieved anything in Europe) and whoever is still in the UEFA Cup to get as far as possible otherwise next seaason there may be only one representative team from Turkey in Europe, how have we gone backwards since Parken!!!

Just goes to show as well who the better team is league form not withstanding. For all the money and foreigeners FB never play well in Europe as its not so easy for the refs to understand when they are fouled! Wonder whether Appiah will be there at the end of August?

Monday, August 21, 2006

Tell me why.....I dont like

So according to half drunk Scotchmen in Wankara, Meduna the Vestel Manisaspor player who collapsed during the Saturday heat exhaustion clinic sponsored by the TFF was "butchered by a Galatasaray player". Whilst I can agree that the sight of a referee giving a penalty to CimBom may be enough to make a player or supporter faint I can honestly say that I think the heat is affecting more than just the players, it seems to be affecting ageing Jocks watching the match in their living rooms!!!! Maybe the kilt should be worn to make sure overheating does not occur! I for one am just glad that he is now out of hospital and that he will make a full recovery and maybe play again this season.

I cannot be bothered to debate the whys and wherefores of the match suffice to say that 2-2 was probably a fair result given Manisa's good play and Galatsaray's average play.


Anyway it seems that after a couple of deaths and collpases that finally the morons who run the TFF have finally agreed to let Aziz Yildirim decide who will win the League this year.....I mean change the times of the kick offs to 9pm so the players have a better than 50% chance of survival.

I see that Ahmet Hoca over at Turkish Soccer was complaining about the quality of the Super Lig. This from someone, like me, living in the US and who probably watches MLS, the no physical contact version of football. Compared to the English Premier then yes the Super Lig is not as exciting and not as even technically good, lets face it Emre struggles with the pace of the game at Newcassel. Also how many other Turkish players play outside of Turkey and Germany. Tugay and he is almost finished!

Is Ahmet Hoca right or not and if he is why.

Is it the number of foreign players in the League? According to the round ball in Ankara here are 102 non-Turkish players including 24 Brazilians, wonder if that includes Mehmet and Mert, Aurelio and Nobhead? Are they good foreigners or are they cheap and keeping Turkish players from the teams. Or is that some clubs simply buy foreigners and forget to develop their young players. I was looking at the Galatsaray team recently and the number of youth team players coming through, Arda, Ugur, Ferhat, Aydin etc. seems good, is that happening everywhere?

Should Turkish players play overseas? I think so. Hasan Sas would be a much better player for having spent 2 or three years being kicked by defenders like Alan Stubbs and Kevin Davies!!!

So is Turkish football going backwards and is Aziz totally to blame!!! You know the answer so lets hear your views!!!

Saturday, August 19, 2006

Football second

Well what can I say, I am still finding it hard to understand what happened in Manisa today. The records will show a 2-2 result which was about fair give that Galatsarary were playing against 14 men.

What the reocrds may not show was the emotion and drama when one of the Mainuisa payers suddenly collpased and had to be taken off the pitch in anambulance, I still am not sure what happened nor what the result is.

Until tomorrow,

Monday, August 14, 2006

Normal service resumed

So finally Galatasaray kick their season off. After the 5-2 demolition of the Czechs in midweek it was the turn of Kayserispor to try to halt the CimBom express.

They failed.

All in all not a good week for the Kayserispor/Erciyespor area with a total of 10 conceeded against real teams. The same can be said of the capital teams as the Kadikoy mob are at the top of the league after the inept, pathetic and obvioulsy bribed performance of Genclerbirligi, no signs of Promise there then......and to think they did not even have Appiah or Serkan Balci playing after their red cards....and the Kankas think Ankaraspor are not worth supporting........

Anyway onto the match. The first 45 minutes, apart from the last minute can be filed in the garbage can, it was worse than watching paint dry, no passion, inept playing and that barn door kept on appearing. In the interests of fairness, an unusual concept for this blog it has to be said, Kayserispor should have had a penalty and Mondragon would have been taking an early shower and that may have changed the game, it might have woken them up!!!Having said that GS should have had a penalty in the first half which would have livened things up, but as usual when no Brazilian is involved (not wearing red and yellow) there was no penalty given. Then Arda scored in the last minute, just when I was thinking of watching Professional Poker on ESPN.

So the second half, cant get much worse, I thought and so it did not. 3 goals scored in the second half, Ilic (2) and Cihan, has he had a nose job, he looked more streamlined anyway. The performance was much better, the ability to pass to each other, score, etc. improving beyond recognition from the first half.

I thought Ilic had an excellent game, as he did on Wednseday as well. I guess he is well rested after the World Cup where he did not excatly spend much energy! I wish the transfer window was closed already as he could still be tempted away although if we get through to the frst round of the Chimps League I guess he will stay.

Who is Arda you say. He is a product of the youth system at Galatasaray, a seemingly unique concept in Istanbul. He has had a good week though, 2 in the Chimps League and one on Sunday.

No coment yet on Carrusca as he has not had much time to impress, but from the little seen of him he looks promising.

So to all the idiots out there shouting for Gerets removal after the 1-1 draw with Ankaraspor, get a life, when a goal keeper has an inspired day there is not much you can do.

Nice touch from Mondragon, after Hakan gave him the captains armband it needed tightening and he got one of the ball boys to do that. When he was finished he gave a kiss to the boys forehead, its amazing what fatherhood can do for a guy!!!

I think that's all for now, time for cay,

Wednesday, August 09, 2006

Home advantage

Excellent result today, even though I could not see much due to the very poor nature of Show TV's webcast. Of course this being Galatasaray they could not do things easily and allowed the Czech team back in to the game with two goals in 2 minutes. Stress andn anxiety resulted, I have to say. That is unforgivable when you are leading 4-0. Maybe they stopped concentrating or something and hopefully things should improve as the team plays more games. I was very glad though that Sabri got the 5th goal as this means we weould have to lose 3-0 in the return match and from what I saw today that does not look possible. But then again this is football and crazier things have happened although it could be said that the Czech's bounced.....

Whilst I am for the most part happy that the Kadikiy mob lost and another player got sent off, Aziz might have to buy some more Brazilians at this rate, if they fail to reach the next stage thenb Turkish football will get fewer points iun the UEFA league table and this can only hurt the opverall effort in the future. Still I hope they get knocked out though as a fanatic, bigoted and partisan CimBom supporter.

Tuesday, August 08, 2006

Chimps League begins

Due to the complete and utter under achievement of Turkish football's representatives in Europe since Galatasaray won the only European competition victory by a Turkish team, the UEFA Cup, Galatasaray despite winning with ease the Super Lig last season now have to go through the disgrace of a qualifying round to get into the Champions League group phases. This is shocking to compare us to Arsenal and other no hope teams. Really what is the world coming to.....

Anyway its a fact and tomorrow we play some unpronouncable team from Czech Republic, Mlada Boleslav. I really hope we play better than on Friday especially as we are at home for the first leg so need a couple of goals and not to concede any.....and if there are penalties I think Mondragon should take them!!!!

More later

Friday, August 04, 2006

Lig TV on the web

To anyone who could not find it here is the address for this seasons Lig TV on the Internet

Barn door

As in could not hit one. Whatever the Galatasaray players do at Florya penalty taking is obvfioulsy not high on the list. Missing one penalty is bad enough but 2 in the same game, useless...

Still a draw is better than a loss even if it was Ankaraspor.

No need to get too down but where is my Prozac......

All we need now os for the mafia to draw or lose

Wednesday, August 02, 2006

Knocking on the door

I cannot believe the season is only 2 days away from starting. It seems like only a heartbeat since the last season finished and then the World Cup kept us all busy if not enthralled. And now on Friday hostilities resume in the Super Lig, whatever happened to summer!!!!!


So Besiktas won the Turkish Super Cup. Normally I would not be too bothered about that except for the fact that Nobhead scored the only goal, typical! Transfers from you know who and then promptly scores against the only worthwhile team from Istanbul!!!

So far not much news on the transfer front but there is still a month almost to go until the transfer window closes so there may be more news to report on that before too long.

Over here in New Jersey the main news is the weather, it is so hot! Today the heat index was 45 which means the temperature plus humidity combined to make it feel like 45 Celsius and that is damn hot. I am suffering, the dogs are suffering and the Husband is suffering. Some rain would be welcome I have to say!!!

So here is looking forward to Friday and the first win of the season inAnkara.