By Richard Beale …..
Two goals from substitute FAMIL in the last 10 minutes enabled Super League high flyers Türk Ocak to finally overcome a stubborn and resolute Esentepe team.
Result : (Friendly Match) – ESENTEPE KKSK 1 TÜRK OCAK 2
Saturday January 11 : Esentepe Erdal Barut Stadium
After scoring two late goals from Azerbaijan Under 21 International Azeri Famil, he will surely be offered a contract with Türk Ocak. The trialist, on as a late replacement, scored both goals in the final 10 minutes to win the match for the visitors.
With the arctic weather having a brief respite, Esentepe played hosts in this friendly match against Super League second place giants Türk Ocak from Girne. Due to the bad weather this week Esentepe have been training on the neighbouring Tatlısu synthetic pitch. I was very surprised that this match was played at Esentepe, with the playing surface being in such poor condition. The surface looks like a herd of Wildebeests have been grazing on it and it has been given no time to recover from wear and tear over the first half of the season.
A pleasant sunny January afternoon was kind to a crowd of around 50 spectators.
Türk Ocak defending in the gold/black strip
Esentepe played some pleasing football in the first half, plenty of movement with some nice passing, with Hüseyin Ermiş and Yakup showing up well. Esentepe had a trialist themselves on show, a forward from Turkey ALI KAFADAR leading the attack, this enabled their only other forward Eray to move out to the left where he showed some neat touches, enjoying more space and freedom.
It was the trialist ALI KAFADAR who gave Esentepe the lead in the 61st minute, when fastening onto a high clearance, he lobbed the Türk Ocak goalkeeper Cenk, despite appeals from the visitors for offside the goal stood. 1-0.
Esentepe were competing well and after three quarters of the match being played, a win for the home team looked a possibility. However, this being a friendly, Coach Salih Özbir rang the changes, virtually changing his whole team. This of course disrupted the team and Türk Ocak gained the initiative and started applying intense pressure to Esentepe.
In the 74th minute Esentepe young defender Gürkan was harshly adjudged to have brought down African player Oha in the box. Justice was done when Oha took the resulting penalty himself, sending goalkeeper Onur the wrong way, but his penalty hit the left hand post and rebounded to safety.
The equaliser was not too far away when replacement FAMİL capitalised on a mistake by Nersin who was caught in possession advanced into the area to beat Onur. 1-1
In the closing minutes Esentepe came under immense pressure Onur making a couple of good saves.
Nersin made up for his earlier mistake clearing off the line in the 87th minute to deny Famil who had rounded Onur.
The Azerbaijanian was not to be denied a minute before time receiving the ball in the middle, he controlled it, turned and beat Onur with a low drive.
A good workout for both teams, very pleased with Esentepe’s first half performance and trialist Ali scoring a goal looks like he could be a good signing for the team. FULL TIME SCORE: 1-2
