Marked for Ümit Akdağ
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad8 Nov 2027
The words a physio says slowly. 82 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Match3 Nov 2027
A European night to remember for Besiktas
0‑0 against Dender, under lights, against people who do not speak the same language as the crowd. These are the evenings a club measures its decade in, and there are never as many of them as anybody expects.
Match6 Nov 2027
15 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
Squad8 Nov 2027
A row about effort at Besiktas
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Orkun Kökçü was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Match6 Nov 2027
It had gone 6 games. The players did not celebrate like men who had won a match; they celebrated like men who had been let out of something.
Squad8 Nov 2027
A falling-out at Besiktas
Oh Hyeon-Gyu and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Match6 Nov 2027
A 2‑0 win over Boluspor, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Player ratings8 Nov 2027
Ninety minutes of Orkun Kökçü at his very best
Marked 8.16. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Besiktas.
The dugout8 Nov 2027
Tiago Djaló gets it from the manager
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad11 Oct 2027
113 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Besiktas lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Squad11 Oct 2027
Words exchanged at Besiktas
Orkun Kökçü and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Loan watch11 Oct 2027
“I did not go to Rizespor to sit and watch. I want to come back to Besiktas and fight for my place.” 0 appearances in 5 matches say the rest.
Squad11 Oct 2027
A row about effort at Besiktas
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Emirhan Topçu was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Looking ahead11 Oct 2027
The neighbours are next for Besiktas
Nothing about the week ahead is ordinary. Fenerbahce on Saturday, a town that has already started talking about it, and a dressing room that does not need telling what it means.
The dugout11 Oct 2027
When it matters, Orkun Kökçü plays
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
The dugout11 Oct 2027
A promise honoured for Ümit Akdağ
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Besiktas told Ümit Akdağ something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
Market11 Oct 2027
The Václav Černý story refuses to die
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Václav Černý signs something — a contract at Besiktas or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
The dugout11 Oct 2027
Tiago Djaló knocks on the manager’s door
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Tiago Djaló trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match25 Sep 2027
Nowhere to hide for Besiktas
0‑3 against Trabzonspor, and no complaints that would survive the replay. The manager spoke about character afterwards; the terraces used shorter words.
The dugout27 Sep 2027
Kassoum Ouattara: that is not what I was promised
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Besiktas have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Market27 Sep 2027
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Squad27 Sep 2027
A row about effort at Besiktas
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Orkun Kökçü was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Boardroom27 Sep 2027
The manager kept them in and said what needed saying. A response is expected on Saturday, and if it does not come the questions move upstairs.
Squad27 Sep 2027
Aleksandar Jovanović was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
The dugout27 Sep 2027
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 0‑3 defeat, delivered by Hakan Akgun to a room that had heard them before.
The dugout27 Sep 2027
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
The dugout27 Sep 2027
Ilhan Fakili gets it from the manager
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Transfer targets12 Jul 2027
Antalyaspor wanted more than $4.3M and the board would not go there. Walked away, for now, which in a transfer window means until somebody blinks.
Market12 Jul 2027
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Besiktas heard it as anything else.
Squad12 Jul 2027
A falling-out at Besiktas
Emmanuel Agbadou and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad12 Jul 2027
A row about effort at Besiktas
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Orkun Kökçü was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad12 Jul 2027
“Some mornings you wake up and you are still a long way from everything you know.” It is not the football and it never was; Besiktas are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Squad12 Jul 2027
Besiktas are still strangers to each other
12 new signings in one window. Every one may be an upgrade and the side can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild the verdicts never mention.
The dugout12 Jul 2027
Orkun Kökçü gets picked when it counts
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Orkun Kökçü is on it.
The dugout12 Jul 2027
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Yusuf Erdoğan, and the manager let it.
Market12 Jul 2027
The name of Václav Černý keeps appearing in other people's back pages. Besiktas say nothing, which says plenty.