The Turkish Football Federation (TFF) has announced that the Turkish Premier League and all other football matches in all competitions in Turkey will resume on 19 December, following the total suspension ordered after the brutal assault on referee Halil Umut Meler at the end of the match between Rizespor and Ankaragücü, committed by the president of the latter team and several members of his coaching staff.
Meler was finally discharged from hospital yesterday after spending three days under observation, leaving under police escort, although he declined to make any statement. TFF president Mehmet Büyükekşi announced that the Federation will announce today the sanctions that Ankaragücü could face following the incident. Referring to the 37-year-old international referee, who travelled to join his family in Izmir, Büyükekşi said he hoped to see him recover soon to referee the Euro 2024 matches in Germany, given his extensive reputation and experience.
While the international referee – included on UEFA’s elite category – declined to make any comment to the media upon his release from hospital yesterday, he did release a statement the day before, in which he claimed that Ankaragücü president Faruk Koca even threatened to kill him. “Faruk Koca told me and my colleagues ‘I will finish you off‘. He said, addressing me in particular, ‘I will kill you‘”. Koca, who was arrested on 12 December along with two others involved in the attack and imprisoned, has now resigned as club president; he was also a member of the Turkish parliament for Ankara for almost a decade for Erdoğan’s AKP party, which ordered his immediate expulsion from the political party after the incident.
VOTE
EDITORIAL TEAM
🧿 About us
.
Edited and reviewed by:
Pablo Gómez is a specialist in Turkey and has been editor-in-chief of Hispanatolia since 2011. He has been analysing current affairs and geopolitics in Turkey and the surrounding region since 2006.
…
📣 Your ADVERTISING on Hispanatolia
.
🤗 HELP US WITH A DONATION:
💗 Paypal
