5 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
At 21 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
Squad6 Dec 2027
Words at Samsunspor training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Joe Mendes 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 is not the end of the world and it is not good enough. Both of those are true.” The manager, after a 0‑0 draw, said the honest thing and then went to say it again inside.
Ninety minutes, no goals, and the argument started before the car park emptied: a point gained, or two thrown away against Besiktas? Both sides of it will still be going on Thursday.
Boluspor go through and Samsunspor go home, 0‑1 the scoreline that did it. The dressing room will call the league the priority now, because that is what dressing rooms say.
Successful dribbles: 22. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
Squad8 Nov 2027
Words at Samsunspor training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Joe Mendes 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.
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Samsunspor can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
Squad8 Nov 2027
Marlon Faß is the division's best young player this month
At 21 he has spent a month being better than everybody his age in the league, which is a different and harder thing than one good afternoon. Samsunspor will try very hard not to make too much of it.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 15 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
Chérif N'Diaye 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.
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Celil Yüksel commits to Samsunspor for another 3 years.
Squad11 Oct 2027
Logi Tómasson 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.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Alexander Nübel signs something — a contract at Samsunspor or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Nobody at Samsunspor 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.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Celil Yüksel trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Amir Hadžiahmetović’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Samsunspor needing him to play as if none of it matters.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Samsunspor have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Samsunspor heard it as anything else.
Merih Demiral 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.
Successful dribbles: 21. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
Squad4 Oct 2027
Words at Samsunspor training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Logi Tómasson 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.
Level with 88 minutes on the clock, after an afternoon Samsunspor had all but put away. Adana Demirspor will call it a point earned; the home dressing room will call it two given away, and both of them are right.
Something was said to Afonso Sousa and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
Alexander Nübel 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Toni Borevković was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Samsunspor are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
Shots: 11. Goals: none. The chances were there and they were good ones, and they went into the stand, the goalkeeper's arms and the side netting in roughly that order.
Chances created: 9. Not on the scoresheet and not remotely anonymous — a passing performance that pulled a defence apart without leaving a mark on the column that gets read.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Samsunspor have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Merih Demiral 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.
At 20 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Logi Tómasson was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Marked 7.37. Ask anyone leaving the ground what settled it and you will get one name, which is the only award that has ever really counted.
The dugout13 Sep 2027
The manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Umut Turuc was not hiding it after 0‑0, and nobody in the Samsunspor dressing room was either.
Alexander Nübel 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Merih Demiral was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The name of Yunus Emre Çift has come up in conversations Samsunspor were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
The manager has re-ordered his thinking and Afonso Sousa has come out of it lower. He will be told it is temporary, and the players who have heard that before will avoid his eye.
He used to be one of the options. He is now one of the men the options are picked around, and the change happened quietly enough that only the dressing room noticed on the day.
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 Yalçın Kayan is on it.
1 for Celil Yüksel, marked 7.80, and a centre-half's name in the part of the report he normally only reaches by mistake. He will not be allowed to forget it in the dressing room for a month.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Samsunspor this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
16 goals and a season average of 7.20 will do that. The space he used to find has gone; he keeps scoring anyway, which is the mark of the real thing.
Squad12 Apr 2027
Words at Samsunspor training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Toni Borevković 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.
Nobody at Samsunspor 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.
“There are things I liked and things we will be doing on Tuesday until they are right.” 1‑1, and a manager who had already decided what Tuesday looked like.
Up for the corner, and Logi Tómasson delivers — 7.73
Centre-halves are allowed forward twice a season and are judged on what they do when they get there. Logi Tómasson scored, was marked 7.73, and got back before anybody noticed he had gone.
Chérif N'Diaye 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.
Beaten 1‑3, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Squad22 Mar 2027
Words at Samsunspor training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Toni Borevković 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.
The dugout22 Mar 2027
The manager’s verdict
“That is on me. I pick the team and I picked wrong.” Managers say that when they mean it and when they need to be seen to, and after 1‑3 Umut Turuc left the room before anybody could ask which.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Samsunspor has been clear about where Taha Tosun stands, which is more than many ever get.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Jaurès Assoumou provided it, and the 9.58 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Samsunspor this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Jaurès Assoumou. 3‑1 against Gaziantep, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Toni Borevković was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Squad26 Oct 2026
12 new faces, and Samsunspor are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
“The players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 3‑1, Umut Turuc could afford to be generous.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Olivier Ntcham was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
It needed Chérif N'Diaye to find the net to bring anything home at all: 1‑1 against Konyaspor, and half the dressing room will call it a point won.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
The view from the dugout
“We did not lose. Some weeks that is all you get, and I would rather have the point than not.” Umut Turuc chose the glass-half-full version of 1‑1; the supporters left with the other one.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Samsunspor, and both men came out saying it was fine.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Samsunspor this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
13 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 dugout28 Sep 2026
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.” Umut Turuc kept it short after the 2‑1 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Olivier Ntcham was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Samsunspor know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
In brief
The dugoutThe plan did not have a place for Okan Kocuk
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Jaurès Assoumou provided it, and the 8.91 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Samsunspor people have started saying his name in the past tense.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Besiktas have kept their man, and Samsunspor go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Chérif N'Diaye 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.
He is 23 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.