Marked for Ibrahim Tekdemir
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market22 Oct 2029
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Fenerbahce heard it as anything else.
Squad22 Oct 2029
A row about effort at Fenerbahce
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Pablo Hurtado was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad22 Oct 2029
Home is on Ruan's mind
“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; Fenerbahce are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
The dugout22 Oct 2029
Romelu Lukaku has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Fenerbahce 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.
Looking ahead22 Oct 2029
Fatih Karagumruk next, and one man in the Fenerbahce dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
Market22 Oct 2029
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until İsmail Yüksek signs something — a contract at Fenerbahce or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
The dugout22 Oct 2029
The manager makes Vedat Muriqi a promise
Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Fenerbahce. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.
The dugout22 Oct 2029
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Ibrahim Tekdemir trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Squad22 Oct 2029
“If we are going to be beaten, let it not be because somebody in here could not be bothered.” He stood up and said it in front of everybody, which is a thing a squad remembers about a man for years.
In brief
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Looking ahead
Home comforts ahead for Fenerbahce
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The dugout
Ruan keeps his manager's vote
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Squad
Word from the training ground: Vedat Muriqi
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad15 Oct 2029
N'Golo Kanté breaks a bone — 17 days out
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 17 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Squad15 Oct 2029
Ahmet Arslan 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.
The dugout15 Oct 2029
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 Lorenzo Montipò is on it.
The dugout15 Oct 2029
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Ahmet Çakmakkaya, and the manager let it.
Squad15 Oct 2029
A year in and the city has not opened up, the language has not come, and lunch is eaten alone more often than anybody at Fenerbahce would admit. It shows on Saturdays.
Market15 Oct 2029
The name of Vedat Muriqi keeps appearing in other people's back pages. Fenerbahce say nothing, which says plenty.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Match29 Sep 2029
A derby is never about the football alone, but the football helped: 2‑0, and the away end emptied early. Bragging rights renewed for another season.
Squad1 Oct 2029
A fracture rules N'Golo Kanté out for 33 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Fenerbahce will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
The dugout1 Oct 2029
“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.
Player ratings1 Oct 2029
The derby has a name on it: Romelu Lukaku
Score against anybody else and it is a goal. Score against them and it is a story with your name in it for a decade, and Fenerbahce supporters have already started telling it.
Squad1 Oct 2029
Words at Fenerbahce training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Pablo Hurtado 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.
Squad1 Oct 2029
Diogo Gonçalves 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.
Looking ahead1 Oct 2029
All roads lead to Besiktas
The fixture the calendar is arranged around. Form goes out of the window, the table is not consulted, and for ninety minutes Fenerbahce will be judged on one thing only.
The dugout1 Oct 2029
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Fenerbahce told Pablo Hurtado something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
The dugout1 Oct 2029
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.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Match25 Nov 2028
Fenerbahce make home a hard place to visit
17 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
Match27 Nov 2028
The view from the top for Fenerbahce
32 points, and the rest of the division looking up. Every side that finishes first spends the season pretending it is not thinking about it, and this one has started pretending.
Match25 Nov 2028
6 wins on the spin now, and the question has changed from whether the run ends to who ends it. Confidence like this cannot be bought; it has to be earned exactly this way.
Market27 Nov 2028
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Fenerbahce they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Player ratings27 Nov 2028
No sign of nerves from Abdullah Dursun at 17 — 8.30
The hardest thing about being 17 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Abdullah Dursun did not need any: 8.30, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
The dugout27 Nov 2028
“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.
Match25 Nov 2028
It finished 2‑1, and it was Anthony Musaba’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Fenerbahce.
The terraces27 Nov 2028
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 17-year-old it feels ownership of. Abdullah Dursun 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.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match7 Aug 2028
89 points on the board and a place in the leading group. Nobody at the ground is saying the word out loud yet.
Market7 Aug 2028
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Fenerbahce is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Market7 Aug 2028
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
Squad7 Aug 2028
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Fenerbahce know it.
Squad7 Aug 2028
Ognjen Mimović 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.
Transfer targets7 Aug 2028
The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.
Squad7 Aug 2028
At 37 the improving is meant to be over, and it is not: 3 points better than a year ago. It happens to the ones who take the boring parts seriously.
Squad7 Aug 2028
A row about effort at Fenerbahce
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Pablo Hurtado was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout7 Aug 2028
İsmail Yüksek 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 İsmail Yüksek is on it.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Transfer targets31 Jul 2028
Fenerbahce asked and Porto said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
The dugout31 Jul 2028
Diogo Gonçalves: 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.” Fenerbahce have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Squad31 Jul 2028
Kuzey Sapaz 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.
Squad31 Jul 2028
At 34 the improving is meant to be over, and it is not: 3 points better than a year ago. It happens to the ones who take the boring parts seriously.
The dugout31 Jul 2028
Diego Carlos 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.
The dugout31 Jul 2028
Pablo Hurtado has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Fenerbahce 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.