Marked for Eymen Yurdcu
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad28 Jul 2031
Gökhan Sazdağı damages knee ligaments — 48 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 48 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.
Squad28 Jul 2031
72 days out for Tunahan Taşçı after a fracture
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Umraniyespor will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Squad28 Jul 2031
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Arman Nahany is 23, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Transfer targets28 Jul 2031
The paperwork begins on Pol Santos
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Umraniyespor have done the hard part with Barcelona, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Transfer targets28 Jul 2031
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Feyenoord is saying, and nobody at Umraniyespor is enjoying the guessing.
Transfer targets28 Jul 2031
Umraniyespor asked and Basaksehir said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Squad28 Jul 2031
At 24 the improving is meant to be over. It is not: 3 points better than the mark taken at the start of the year, which is the sort of thing that happens to players who take the boring parts of the job seriously.
The dugout28 Jul 2031
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
Transfer targets28 Jul 2031
A loan move for Sevastian Belov is in the works
Umraniyespor have made the call to Santa Clara. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad21 Jul 2031
79 days out for Tunahan Taşçı after a fracture
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Umraniyespor will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Market21 Jul 2031
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Umraniyespor, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad21 Jul 2031
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Eymen Yurdcu is 22, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Squad21 Jul 2031
Yasir Subaşı in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Umraniyespor this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Transfer targets21 Jul 2031
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Porto have kept their man, and Umraniyespor go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Squad21 Jul 2031
Mustafa Duru falls out with a teammate over standards
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.
Transfer targets21 Jul 2031
A loan enquiry to Feyenoord: cover, or a look at somebody the club cannot afford to buy yet. Either way the answer will come back inside the week.
The dugout21 Jul 2031
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 dugout21 Jul 2031
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Diago Guzmán, and the manager let it.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
The dugout1 Jul 2030
Eymen Yurdcu: 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.” Umraniyespor have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Transfer targets1 Jul 2030
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at RC Strasbourg is saying, and nobody at Umraniyespor is enjoying the guessing.
Squad1 Jul 2030
Miguel Patrício is a better footballer than he was
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 23 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
Squad1 Jul 2030
Tunahan Taşçı 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.
Squad1 Jul 2030
“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; Umraniyespor are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Squad1 Jul 2030
Words at Umraniyespor training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Saba Samushia 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.
Transfer targets1 Jul 2030
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Racing Club have kept their man, and Umraniyespor go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Transfer targets1 Jul 2030
A loan enquiry to Fiorentina: cover, or a look at somebody the club cannot afford to buy yet. Either way the answer will come back inside the week.
The dugout1 Jul 2030
Emir Yaşar has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Umraniyespor 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.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Boardroom24 Jun 2030
The scrutiny sharpens at Umraniyespor
Nobody upstairs has said anything, which is the loudest thing they could do. Results buy silence in this game; the account at Umraniyespor is running low.
Squad24 Jun 2030
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Tunahan Taşçı commits to Umraniyespor for another 4 years.
Squad24 Jun 2030
Eymen Yurdcu is a better footballer than he was
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 20 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
Transfer targets24 Jun 2030
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Fenerbahce have kept their man, and Umraniyespor go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Squad24 Jun 2030
Yasir Subaşı 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.
Squad24 Jun 2030
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Umraniyespor can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
Transfer targets24 Jun 2030
RC Strasbourg 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.
Transfer targets24 Jun 2030
A loan enquiry to Napoli: cover, or a look at somebody the club cannot afford to buy yet. Either way the answer will come back inside the week.
The dugout24 Jun 2030
Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Umraniyespor. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad13 May 2030
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 25 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Market13 May 2030
Only the photograph left for Emir Yaşar
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Emir Yaşar will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Umraniyespor the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad13 May 2030
Tunahan Taşçı falls out with a teammate over standards
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.
Squad13 May 2030
Yasir Subaşı in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Umraniyespor this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The dugout13 May 2030
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Eymen Yurdcu, and the manager let it.
The dugout13 May 2030
Ellis Moss asks for a word with the manager
“I would rather say it to his face than read about it.” The meeting was requested by the player, which tells you most of what you need to know.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad18 Mar 2030
82 days out for Enver Cenk Şahin after a fracture
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Umraniyespor will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Market18 Mar 2030
Emir Yaşar has one foot out of the door
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Umraniyespor they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad18 Mar 2030
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Tunahan Taşçı was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad18 Mar 2030
Yasir Subaşı in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Umraniyespor this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Match16 Mar 2030
Fatih Karagumruk left with the points after a 1‑2 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Player ratings18 Mar 2030
Successful dribbles: 19. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
The dugout18 Mar 2030
“I could talk about decisions and I could talk about luck. I will not. We lost.” The manager, 1‑2, and a press conference that lasted four minutes.
Squad18 Mar 2030
Defences have started doubling up on Tunahan Taşçı
5 goals and a season average of 7.24 will do that. The space he used to find has gone; he keeps scoring anyway, which is the mark of the real thing.
The dugout18 Mar 2030
Ninety specific minutes wanted a different sort of player, and the manager picked one. He is not out of form and he is not in the side, and both are true.