The 2023 Turkish Super Cup between Galatasaray and Fenerbahce was due to be held on 30th December in Saudi Arabia. The match coincided with the 100th anniversary of the founding of both the Turkish Football Federation and the Turkish Republic.

What could possibly go wrong?

Well, the whole centenary celebration thing involved displaying banners commemorating the founder of the Turkish Republic, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk. The Saudi Arabian officials said this was against the match regulations. The teams didn't want to play the game without commemorating Ataturk and didn't take to the pitch. The match was postponed with a number of fans already in attendance.

The match was re-arranged to be played today in Sanliurfa -a Turkish city, so there would be no issues in celebrating the centenary. The scenes witnessed in December in Saudi Arabia couldn't be repeated.

What could possibly go wrong?

Well, on 17th March Fenerbahce players were attacked by fans invading the pitch following their away win at Trabzonspor. Trabzonspor were initially punished with six home games behind closed doors, but this was reduced to four on appeal. So outraged were Fenerbahce that they actually put withdrawing from the Turkish Super League to their members in a vote. The members voted against withdrawal, but it seems the relationship between Fenerbachce and the TFF was still damaged. Fenerbahce applied for a postponement of today's Super Cup to allow them more time to prepare for next week's Europa Conference League quarter final with Olympiakos on Thursday. They also applied for the Super Cup to be officiated by a foreign referee. The TFF refused both requests.

It had been rumoured that Fenerbahce would protest the above developments by not playing the full 90 minutes of the Super Cup, but the details of how they would implement this weren't known. Only turning up with 9 players then having three players swiftly leave the game with deliberately obtained red cards or "injuries" was the rumour mill favorite (once a team is reduced to 6 players the match forfeited - an easy rule to forget given how infrequently that occurs).

How Fenerbahce implemented the protest was to field a U19 team, who went 1-0 down within a minute, then refused to restart the game and walked off the pitch. The match was officially called off after 3 minutes, but not even that much of the game was actually played. Galatasaray's first XI played their substitutes and reserves in an impromptu match so as to give fans who attended something for their trouble, but of course the fans have once again been cheated as this wasn't the Super Cup Final they paid to watch. Of course, whatever long term sanction they receive for this, in the short term Fenerbahce achieve their goals of protesting against their treatment and crucially, of resting their first team players ahead of the Europa Conference League quarter final.

All I know is twice I sat down to watch this match and twice it got called off - it's like the match was cursed!

RM

Real_Mardin wrote:

> (once a team is reduced to 6 players the match forfeited - an easy rule to forget given how infrequently that occurs).

I've personally seen it happen once. Can't remember the precise details but it was a friendly between Holland and Honduras U23 (I think - or was it El Salvador U23?) sometime in the 1990's. Holland were already quite a few goals ahead when their U23 opponents hit 5 red cards and the match was stopped.

This passed me by at the time but googling the topic the most notorious example appears to be the "Battle of Brammall Lane" between Sheffield United and West Bromwich Albion in 2002. The wikipedia entry is worth a read:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Bramall_Lane

RM

Real_Mardin wrote:

> Real_Mardin wrote:

> This passed me by at the time but googling the topic the most notorious example appears to be the "Battle of Brammall Lane" between Sheffield United and West Bromwich Albion in 2002. The wikipedia entry is worth a read:

> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Bramall_Lane

Pretty remarkable stuff. Here is the youtube video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q7Npy-MuCJQ

Also, notice the horrible state of the turf and the baggy uniforms. Early 2000s football.

Futbolmetrix wrote:

> Real_Mardin wrote:

>> Real_Mardin wrote:

>> This passed me by at the time but googling the topic the most notorious example appears to be the "Battle of Brammall Lane" between Sheffield United and West Bromwich Albion in 2002. The wikipedia entry is worth a read:

>> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Bramall_Lane

> Pretty remarkable stuff. Here is the youtube video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q7Npy-MuCJQ

Thanks, good find! Interesting that there had been ‘history” between Santos and Johnson (the recipient of his sliding tackle) the last time they met. Curle should have been sent off for punching the WBA player when United were down to 8, but I see from the article that the referee admitted not sending Curle off in a failed attempt to make the match last 90 minutes.

> Also, notice the horrible state of the turf and the baggy uniforms. Early 2000s football.

I miss the baggy kits!

RM