this was a great match with twists and turns all the way through. with other results going our way genclerbirligi now find themselves in fourth place and in a great position to get into the play-offs. there is still a long way to go but my confidence is high.
kayserispor 2 - 3 genclerbirligi
i may have been the only kanka at the beer bus on sunday afternoon but i was joined by about 30 gencler fans, all of whom were just a little bit scared. gencler has been playing okay footy since the half-way mark, but not brilliant football. kayseri on the other hand have been doing pretty well recently.
on to the match and it was good to see we were pretty much back to our regular line-up. cem can was back from his red card-forced sidelining. the attack looked good, with herve tum up front supported on the wings by hursut and yasin. oktay and azofeifa in midfield. aykut back for good at the back and the rest all names we are now familiar with.
kick-off and er... er... it was all kayserispor. they looked more dangerous and controlled the vast majority of the ball. it was only a bit of luck that saved us on a few occasions with former gencler player james troisi looking especially dangerous.
but football is football and it was pretty much against the run of play when we took the lead. a free-kick from a fair distance. azofeifa takes it, straight to aykut's head and in.
much cheering at the beer bus but it wasn't long before troisi equalised. he had an excellent match for kayseri. "your countryman just scored against us" one of the alkaralar honchos told me as i tried to hide under the table. it wasn't so long ago when they used to clap me on the back as if i had personally scored whenever one of the gencler aussies found the back of the net. not any more obviously.
half-time and most reckoned we could win the match. we had a few shots well saved, some shots which should have been goals and at least one off the post. we could get this.
then something we don't see very often. yasin sent the ball along the ground to tum just outside the box and he kicked it with a great left footer into the goal. let me repeat that, he actually kicked, as opposed to headed, a goal. 2-1 up and there was nothing but joy.
not long later though kayseri equalised again thanks to some bad man marking at the back. come'on boys. we can still do it.
and we did. five minutes of injury time were announced and with one of them gone, ergun sent a ball through to former ankaragucu player murat dururer on the left. he ran with it and passed perfectly to ermin zec who made no mistake. final result. 2 - 3.
all up a great match. lots of goals, lots of attacking football from both sides and, most importantly, the right result.
it certainly is fun to be supporting gencler this season.
