11 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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Samsunspor will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Vedat Muriqi 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.
Samsunspor had done everything except persuade the man himself. He stays at Fatih Karagumruk, and the manager goes back to the drawing board with the money still in the bank.
The offer went to Rizespor this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.
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.
Every long career reaches the week the player starts thinking about the last one. He would like it to be at the club that first put him on a pitch, and Samsunspor now know that too.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 60 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
6 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.
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.
4 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Samsunspor can tell you which week it ends in.
200 games in this shirt, through managers and relegations and everything else. Service like it is disappearing from the game and the crowd knows what it is watching.
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 Alexander Nübel is on it.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Samsunspor will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Some goals win a match and some take one off somebody else. Chérif N'Diaye scored in the 86th minute, Fatih Karagumruk had already begun thinking about the journey home, and Samsunspor took the lot.
“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.
Joe Mendes 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.
It happens to all of them and it is still the hardest paragraph a local paper has to write. 36 years old, 3 points down on where he was, and a body that has started charging interest on a career.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Samsunspor, and 5 appearances in 20 say he has earned the hearing.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 96 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Vedat Muriqi 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.
Squad20 May 2030
Celil Yüksel 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.
Sivasspor will want this one forgotten quickly: 3‑0, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Samsunspor were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 22 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
A defender on the scoresheet, which happens rarely enough that everybody in the ground remembers who took the corner. 1 for him, and a mark of 7.91 for the rest of it.
Alexander Nübel and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad22 Apr 2030
Words at Samsunspor training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rick van Drongelen 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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Samsunspor will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Vedat Muriqi 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Rick van Drongelen was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
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. 10 actions, 7.62, and a manager who will not be substituting him again in a hurry.
Successful dribbles: 16. 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.
The dugout25 Mar 2030
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 1‑2 Interim Coach left the room before anybody could ask which.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Samsunspor will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
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.
Successful dribbles: 19. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
Squad18 Mar 2030
Celil Yüksel 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.
“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 dugout18 Mar 2030
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 1‑3 defeat, delivered by Interim Coach to a room that had heard them before.
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.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Samsunspor will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Basaksehir will want this one forgotten quickly: 3‑0, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Samsunspor were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 20 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
Squad25 Feb 2030
Words at Samsunspor training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Celil Yüksel 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.
200 games in the shirt. Nobody sets out to build a record like that; it happens to a certain kind of player at a certain kind of club, and this town knows what it has.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Samsunspor will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Match12 Jan 2030
Ali Akman wins it after the whistle should have gone
95 minutes played. Ali Akman found the finish in time that only existed because of earlier delays, and Trabzonspor went from a point to nothing inside one movement.
The phone has started ringing about Alexander Nübel again, and this time the name on the line is Olympiacos. Samsunspor are listening politely and promising nothing.
1 for Celil Yüksel, marked 7.88, 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.
The offer from Amedspor for Okan Kocuk was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
Alexander Nübel 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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Samsunspor will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Player ratings7 Jan 2030
Up for the corner, and Celil Yüksel delivers — 7.76
Centre-halves are allowed forward twice a season and are judged on what they do when they get there. Celil Yüksel scored, was marked 7.76, and got back before anybody noticed he had gone.
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 Rick van Drongelen was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Samsunspor asked and Rizespor said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Minute 88, against Eyupspor, and a goal that felt like a win to everybody who had stayed. It was a draw. Nobody leaving the ground will describe it as one.
11 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.
1 kept out in the shoot-out, and a stadium that will still be describing them in twenty years. A goalkeeper only needs one of these to be remembered forever.
Beaten 0‑1, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Squad24 Dec 2029
Celil Yüksel 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.
0‑2 away to the standard of Borussia Dortmund. Nobody will pretend this was a scandal; the gap is real, it is measurable, and closing it is a project rather than a team talk.
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.
Beaten 0‑1, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Squad3 Dec 2029
Words at Samsunspor training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Celil Yüksel 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.
Successful dribbles: 18. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
The dugout3 Dec 2029
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 0‑1 Interim Coach left the room before anybody could ask which.
0‑1 away to the standard of Partizan. Nobody will pretend this was a scandal; the gap is real, it is measurable, and closing it is a project rather than a team talk.
Joe Mendes 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.
Successful dribbles: 21. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad12 Nov 2029
Words at Samsunspor training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Celil Yüksel 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.
Warm-up bib, ninety minutes of watching, and a handshake at the end that fooled nobody. Big matches tell you who a manager trusts; this one told Eren Karadağ.
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.
4 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.
Joe Mendes 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.
4 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Samsunspor can tell you which week it ends in.
Successful dribbles: 19. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad22 Oct 2029
Words at Samsunspor training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Celil Yüksel 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 Oct 2029
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.” Interim Coach chose the glass-half-full version of 0‑0; the supporters left with the other one.
Samsunspor interviewed the field and appointed the corridor: Interim Coach keeps the job he had been doing in all but title. Sometimes the safest pair of hands is the one already holding the wheel.
“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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Celil Yüksel was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The ambition story running backwards, and the one nobody tells: a footballer who wants a smaller ground, fewer cameras and a crowd that does not turn. It is not weakness and it is rarely reported as anything else.
The dugout1 Oct 2029
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 0‑1 Interim Coach 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 Yalçın Kayan stands, which is more than many ever get.
37 days since the seat came open, a list of names doing the rounds, and nobody has signed anything. Every week this drags on the shortlist gets shorter.
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.
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.
4 matches without defeat, and then Galatasaray. Nobody at the ground pretended it would go on forever; nobody expected it to stop here either.
The dugout17 Sep 2029
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 0‑2 Interim Coach left the room before anybody could ask which.
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.
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.
Squad10 Sep 2029
Words at Samsunspor training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Celil Yüksel 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 was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Samsunspor has been clear about where Emrehan Gedikli stands, which is more than many ever get.
73 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Samsunspor lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
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.
38 games and 0 goals away from here, and a man the manager did not have last summer. The loan did what loans are supposed to do and almost never do.
Squad28 May 2029
Celil Yüksel 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 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 Okan Kocuk has written the date down.
In brief
The dugoutAli Fidan asks for a word with the manager
95 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Samsunspor lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
The board’s statement ran to three sentences and one of them mentioned results. Kerem Ozcan has managed long enough to translate: win soon, or the next statement is shorter.
“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 Samsunspor hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Alexander Nübel and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad7 May 2029
Celil Yüksel 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.
Every squad has men who were signed by a particular manager and men who were merely inherited. Ismaël Konaté is in the first group, and the man who wanted him here is no longer in the building.
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.
Benhur Keser damages knee ligaments — 118 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 118 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.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Zdravko Dimitrov provided it, and the 8.39 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Alexander Nübel 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.
At 23 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Celil Yüksel was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
126 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Samsunspor lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Galatasaray go through and Samsunspor go home, 0‑0 the scoreline that did it. The dressing room will call the league the priority now, because that is what dressing rooms say.
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.
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.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Zdravko Dimitrov and Samsunspor agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Squad2 Apr 2029
Words at Samsunspor training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rick van Drongelen 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 much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Samsunspor told Alexander Nübel something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
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.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Samsunspor, another week without a signature from Celil Yüksel.
The team at the top of the table next, and the honest measure of where this side actually is. Anybody can beat the club below them; the question is what happens against Galatasaray.
0‑0 against FCSB, under lights, against people who do not speak the same language as the crowd. These are the evenings a club measures its decade in, and there are never as many of them as anybody expects.
A shoot-out is remembered by its ending, and this one ends with Alexander Nübel: 1 kept out, and a set of supporters who will describe every one of them for the next twenty years.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Celil Yüksel was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“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.
0‑2 against FCSB. Continental football is unforgiving about the things a domestic league lets a side get away with, and this was a night spent finding out which of those the club still has.
Some goals win a match and some take one off somebody else. Bariş Kalaycı scored in the 85th minute, Sakaryaspor had already begun thinking about the journey home, and Samsunspor took the lot.
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.
Sakaryaspor made Samsunspor work for it, but the scoreboard read 1‑0 at the end and the table does not ask how.
Squad5 Mar 2029
Celil Yüksel 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.
18 times he got in the way of something. Centre-halves get written about when they make mistakes and ignored when they do not, so an afternoon like this needs saying out loud: he is the reason the scoreline reads as it does.