The Fenerbahce Sentinel
Squad2 May 2044
A knee injury of the worst kind for Ali Topcu
19 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Fenerbahce lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Player ratings2 May 2044
Vadim Rakov scores twice — 8.18
Two goals and a mark of 8.18 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Squad2 May 2044
11 seasons of Grady Makiobo
320 appearances across 11 seasons in these colours. Careers like that are not built any more, and Fenerbahce know what they have.
Market2 May 2044
Bendegúz Kovács wants to know where this is going
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Fenerbahce hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Player ratings2 May 2044
Lasse Falk runs at them all day
Successful dribbles: 25. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Market2 May 2044
Jeroen Aké is on his way
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.
Squad2 May 2044
James Beadle 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 Fenerbahce this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad2 May 2044
Sampson Dweh 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.
Match30 Apr 2044
Whatever happens, Fenerbahce do not lose
7 games unbeaten now. Some were earned and some were survived, but a habit is forming — and habits are the hardest thing in football to play against.
In brief
- Boardroom Fenerbahce release $11.2M for the manager
- Match Honours even between Fenerbahce and Alanyaspor
- Player ratings Off the bench and decisive: Jonas Wind