Words at Konyaspor training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jean-Luc Dompé is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Konyaspor this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The dugout22 Nov 2027
The manager’s verdict
“I am not going to get carried away and I will not let them either. It was a good day. There will be harder ones.” Caner Tufan kept it short after the 1‑0 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
Nobody at Konyaspor will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Konyaspor told Ata Yanık something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
A 2‑1 win over Fatih Karagumruk, and the draw for the next round can be watched with some interest for once.
Player ratings8 Nov 2027
A brace, and Ebrima Colley takes the afternoon — 8.80
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Ebrima Colley provided it, and the 8.80 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
“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; Konyaspor are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Konyaspor this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Diogo Gonçalves was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. İsmail Buğa has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
A midfielder is measured on whether the team functions when he is on the pitch, which is nearly impossible to see and completely obvious in retrospect. 9 actions, 7.03, and a manager who will not be substituting him again in a hurry.
Level with 89 minutes on the clock, after an afternoon Konyaspor had all but put away. Genclerbirligi will call it a point earned; the home dressing room will call it two given away, and both of them are right.
In brief
Player ratingsThe afternoon belonged to Enis Bardhi
16 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Konyaspor lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Konyaspor can pretend not to have heard.
5 boys move up, and somewhere in the building the people who coached them at twelve are quietly having the best morning of their working year. Nothing about this shows up in a result and it is why the academy exists.
Squad16 Aug 2027
Words at Konyaspor training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Diogo Gonçalves is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Riechedly Bazoer 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Deniz Ertaş has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Ali Tekdemir has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
25 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Konyaspor lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Esenler Erokspor keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
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.
A conversation in the manager’s office, and a commitment that came out of it. Promises like that are cheap to make and expensive to break, and Enis Destan has written the date down.
35 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Konyaspor lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
The name of Sander Svendsen has come up in conversations Konyaspor were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Basaksehir have kept their man, and Konyaspor go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Esenler Erokspor have been asked whether they would lend him. Loans are agreed quickly or not at all, and this one will be one or the other by the weekend.
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 Riechedly Bazoer is on it.
Nothing is announced when this happens and everybody knows. He is a bigger part of the plan at Konyaspor than he was a month ago, and the training ground worked that out before the team sheet said so.