Fenerbahçe halfway to dramatic comeback
ISTANBUL- Hürriyet Daily News
Fenerbahçe’s bid for a dramatic comeback found a lifeline on Sunday, as the team beat Galatasaray 2-1 in their Spor Toto Super League championship playoff game. Goals by Reto Ziegler and Miroslav Stoch clinched the victory for Fenerbahçe, while goalkeeper Volkan Demirel’s man of the match performance helped the Istanbul team to hold on to the win. The victory means second-place Fenerbahçe cut its five-point gap with Galatasaray to two, with four matches left in the playoffs, or Super Final. Fenerbahçe will have the advantage of hosting Galatasaray for a possible title-deciding game on the last day of the season next month. The fact that Galatasaray’s last win at Şükrü Saracoğlu Stadium was in 1999 puts Fenerbahçe in the driver’s seat.
However, the title race is not merely a trophy quest for Fenerbahçe, whose entire 2011-2012 campaign has been marred by a match-fixing case. Chairman Aziz Yıldırım has been in jail pending charges since July 2011 as part of the case, which alleges that club officials attempted to manipulate several matches on the road to the team’s 18th league title last year.
Fans, however, have championed the idea that Fenerbahçe is the victim of the case, which they believe to be a plot to take over the coveted chairmanship of the club. Several demonstrations were held to protest the case, and players, led by Demirel, Alex de Souza and Gökhan Gönül, made it clear that the team would play to show that last year’s title was not the result of manipulation, and said they want to “present the trophy” to Yıldırım. Fenerbahçe’s motivation is not limited to the football team, however: The Fenerbahçe Universal women’s volleyball team dedicated the CEV Champions League trophy to Yıldırım last month.
