Acun Ilıcalı continues his statements regarding Galatasaray: 'We say bring it on'

Fenerbahçe Vice President Acun Ilıcalı spoke to Fenerbahçe TV regarding the statements made by Galatasaray Board Member İbrahim Hatipoğlu concerning the review of refereeing errors in matches by foreign referees.

Sharing the details of the agreement made for the referee evaluation, our Vice President stated the following:

“I spoke on social media yesterday, but I had actually pointed to today to explain the details. First of all, let me briefly explain this issue of bringing in foreign referees to review the positions.

As you know, Galatasaray official İbrahim Hatipoğlu said on a live broadcast, ‘If you want, let’s look at the positions. Let a foreign referee come and review them.’ We responded as the management through our official account. We said, ‘Let’s look at the positions from any season you want, starting from this year. You bring the referee you want, and let’s review them this way.’ They are the ones who made the offer, and we are the ones who accepted it. Then Mr. Hatipoğlu called me. We had a nice conversation.

In that conversation, ‘Okay, let’s bring a referee. How shall we do it?’ I said, ‘You invite a referee from abroad, I will ask UEFA, let’s request a referee. Let’s review the positions together with the two referees we bring.’ Mr. Hatipoğlu said, ‘Okay.’ While we were talking, we were speaking very politely and nicely. If you remember, after the Galatasaray-Beşiktaş match, an ugly statement came from the Galatasaray account against us, pointing at us.

There is a reference to us. I said, ‘Mr. Hatipoğlu, we are in such a good dialogue with you, why are you making such a statement on the other hand?’ He said, ‘I am not aware of that statement.’ I said, ‘Okay.’ What can I say if you are not aware? At that moment, a statement attacking Fenerbahçe comes from Galatasaray. I continued in a nice way again. I said, ‘Our referee is ready.’ They said, ‘We haven’t found a referee yet.’ A week passed like this. In the second week, I said, ‘The referee is coming now.’ It is not clear why we didn’t finish this in one week. It became the second week, he said, ‘We still haven’t found a referee.’ I said, ‘Mr. Hatipoğlu, it is not very difficult to find a referee from abroad. If you want, we can find one.’ He said, ‘It won’t work if you find one.’ I said, ‘Okay, you find one.’ He said, ‘Can you give me some time? 1 day.’

‘Of course,’ I said. The next day he called me and said, ‘Okay, we found a referee.’ As a referee, we suggested Mark Clattenburg, who managed the Champions League final. The name Markus Merk came from them. I said, ‘Okay, very good. Let’s do it.’ He said, ‘But let’s do this during the national team break.’ I said ‘Okay’ to that too. We said, ‘Let’s do it during the national team break.’ Now there is a very interesting situation. We are talking to him, messaging each other. He finally sent me a message saying, ‘This date is suitable for Markus Merk.’

He mentioned the national team break. I called him and said, ‘Okay, that date is also suitable, the national team break date is also fine.’ He asked for the date, we agreed on the date, we agreed on the referees. Everyone already knows this process. We are sharing it with everyone. I guess it is not a secret conversation either. Since journalists know the beginning of this conversation, they keep asking us, ‘What happened?’ In order to enlighten the journalists and the public, I said, ‘We decided to look at the positions during the national team break,’” he said.

"I AM EXPLAINING EVERYTHING TRANSPARENTLY"

Stating that he wanted to explain one more detail, Ilıcalı said, "There is a detail in this process, I have to explain that too. All my fellow managers keep telling me, ‘They won’t come.’ ‘No, we are talking, we are in dialogue.’ ‘They won’t come.’ I said, ‘They determined the referee.’ ‘No, they will find something, they won’t come.’ Finally, I said, ‘We determined the date, we said national team break. They are the ones who made the offer anyway, we said okay.’ Our people said again, ‘They won’t come.’ I tweeted, they said, ‘They won’t come again.’ After the tweet, a statement, ‘Sneakiness, there is a plan, no, like this’

I am asking once again. I am explaining everything transparently. Where is the plan in this? We said, ‘Let’s bring a foreign referee, let two top-level referees review them.’ We said, ‘Let’s look at the past season too.’ We talked to İbrahim Hatipoğlu. First, let’s look at this season, he said, ‘Let’s look at the past season too.’ We already want to look at the past season. Our rights were actually violated last season. Let’s look at everywhere you want anyway.

There is no problem. The point here is, we cannot get you to the table. There is a sentence by a former Galatasaray manager, ‘The thief who runs from the scale is guilty.’ Unfortunately, we see a team running from the scale right now. It doesn’t matter. Experienced people were expecting this, I wasn’t. The experience I had is this: I did not make any disrespectful statement to Galatasaray. I did not belittle or smear the Galatasaray club. I pointed out referee errors, their managers came out and talked nonsense about me, tried to smear me. Now I am talking to another manager of theirs, we are agreeing, his message ‘During the national team break’ is still here. Everything is now documented, concrete.

This time, hop, ‘Oh sir, you made a statement without asking us.’ These are not secret information anyway. I am already talking to everyone about this. What did I do? Are we doing a secret operation together? Are you used to secrecy? What is the issue? Does everything have to be secret? Why aren’t we transparent? I didn’t understand. Is this such a secret topic? Let me explain it this way, we read that Galatasaray would give us a positive answer on this issue primarily from pro-Galatasaray accounts.

Before Mr. İbrahim called me, I already read on social media that ‘Galatasaray will give a positive answer to Fenerbahçe.’

You didn’t foresee confidentiality in communication either. You also made a statement to the press on this issue. This issue is not a secret issue anyway. We are not hiding anything. I didn’t understand what the problem is with informing people in communication,” he said.

"WE ARE INVITING AGAIN"

Making a call to the Galatasaray Club once again, Acun Ilıcalı said, "We will bring the referee they have been postponing for 3 weeks during the national team break. A referee or referees from abroad. It doesn’t matter. We will bring them, we will have them watch the positions. We will give the positions to them. They can participate if they want. We are inviting them again. They had an invitation, didn’t they? We are inviting them again.

Come on, bring your positions. Let’s put them together, let them be reviewed. If you don’t agree, send us the positions you want, let’s show them, but don’t try to say, ‘Oh sir, why is this position not here, that position is not there.’ We say, ‘Bring it on,’ we say, ‘The positions you want.’ Do not try to dilute the matter after not participating. You have been smearing me since the day I became a manager.

I am already laughing. We are after the truth. I said it in my statement the other day. We want justice not for ourselves, but for every team. We want every team to be equal. We are in the struggle for this. ‘If there is a problem, let’s show it to foreign referees so it can be seen,’ we said. Or rather, the offer came from you, we accepted. We accepted your offer, you are nowhere to be found.

Again, ‘Oh sir, you said this, you made a statement first, I was very offended, you made a statement without asking us.’ I gave information about the situation. I gave the concrete day and date of what we agreed on. Everything is already written here.

We said, ‘National team break,’ and I had already said, ‘National team break.’ I couldn’t understand what is here, what you found, and why you reacted this way. Maybe they had a problem among themselves. If they solve that too, we are waiting,” he said.

RESPONSE FROM İBRAHİM HATİPOĞLU TO Acun Ilıcalı

Galatasaray Sportif A.Ş Deputy Chairman İbrahim Hatipoğlu responded to the statements of Fenerbahçe Vice President Acun Ilıcalı, saying, “We were trying to set up a scale and measure some things fairly. However, this scale was overturned by them.”

In the 4th week of the UEFA Europa League, Galatasaray defeated the English representative Tottenham, whom they hosted, 3-2. After the match, Galatasaray Sportif A.Ş Deputy Chairman İbrahim Hatipoğlu made statements to the press.

"EVERYONE WITNESSED IT ONCE AGAIN"

Starting his words by stating that football fans witnessed another historic match, Hatipoğlu said, “Galatasaray defeated an English team today with a great game and breaking statistical records, in line with the goal set by our founding president Ali Sami Yen against foreign teams. We are proud of this. We thank our technical team, our players, and all our employees who gave us this success. We watched the match with great pride. Just like in the Super League, we continue our way in the Europa League by breaking records. I think all football fans, including those in England, watched the match with great pleasure today. Everyone witnessed the power of Galatasaray once again. We had set a goal when we started this cup; we wanted to play in the final. Our first goal was to enter the top 8. We are moving forward with firm steps on this path,” he said.

RESPONSE TO ILICALI’S STATEMENTS

Galatasaray board member İbrahim Hatipoğlu also responded to the statements of Fenerbahçe Vice President Acun Ilıcalı, saying, “First of all, let this week be successful for Turkish teams. Let us convey our wishes for success. I hope that at the end of this night, all Turkish teams will return to our country with victories. We had a statement that we have been champions for 2 years despite referee errors. The biggest mistakes were made against us, despite this, an perception was being tried to be created. We were stating that this perception is not correct and that it can be seen very easily by establishing an impartial referee committee and reviewing them. After our last statement, a call for dialogue came from Fenerbahçe. In response to this call, I called him. All the dialogue between us consists of 4-5 phone calls and a few correspondences. A document was sent to our club today around 15:40. They wanted the records and messages between us to be shared and they gave us a deadline until 16:30. Yes, referee names were discussed between us. It was discussed that this could be done during the national break. A common opinion was formed on the referee issue on these, but there was no definitive agreement between us. If there had been such an agreement, it would have been announced with a joint statement from both parties. Without any knowledge, this process was announced by them with a social media post. While there were still many things to be discussed about how it would be done. I evaluate this as follows; we were trying to set up a scale and measure some things fairly. However, this scale was overturned by them. From now on, we are still of the same claim. But for us to make this claim, there must be a reliable and serious interlocutor in front of us. Every time we showed these efforts with good intentions, we were always disappointed. Because of this, I apologize to the entire Galatasaray community for entering into a wrong dialogue,” he said.

"HIS CONTRACT HAS BEEN DISCUSSED SINCE OSIMHEN ARRIVED"

İbrahim Hatipoğlu gave the following answer to the question, "Will you buy Osimhen’s transfer rights?":

“All Galatasaray fans and all football fans should watch Osimhen with pleasure and pride because he is here. Since Osimhen arrived here, his contract has been constantly discussed. He is one of the most important players in the world. It was an opportunity transfer and he is with us today as a 1-year loan with his desire to play for Galatasaray. Of course, everyone would want Osimhen to be bought. But what should not be forgotten is that he is a player with a very serious budget and suitors. There is no point in making talks like we will buy him. Osimhen is with us until June. We have a long process ahead of us. Of course, we will push the opportunities again. When the time comes, we will do our best for such a great player to continue with us.”

"THE PEAK OF THIS HAPPINESS IS OF COURSE THE FINAL IN BILBAO"

Upon being reminded of his speech, "We won the UEFA Cup. Why shouldn't we aim for the final and reach the final in such a story" after they were eliminated by Young Boys in the UEFA Champions League play-off round and said goodbye to the tournament, Hatipoğlu said, “After the Young Boys match, I said that the Champions League was closed for us, but that we would continue our way in the UEFA Europa League with its new format with the goal of reaching the final. Thank God, we have a strong team today that gives signals of this on the field. When we completed the transfers, we were estimating what level our team’s power would reach. Today, we see that these estimates of ours are largely correct, we have a very strong and willing team, there is a team on the field that gives pleasure to those who watch and makes all Galatasaray fans happy in the matches. The peak of this happiness is of course the final in Bilbao. I hope God gives us this opportunity. After 25 years, Galatasaray will have brought a European cup to Turkey in football again,” he said.

"EVERYTHING IS CLEARLY VISIBLE ON THE FIELD"

Emphasizing that they are at the top in many statistics in both the Europa League and the Super League, the Galatasaray official said, “Let me say this clearly; the structure is being tried, Galatasaray has played 4 matches. At the end of these 4 matches, it is the only team since the Europa League was founded that has shot the most, entered the most positions, and had more than 8 clear goal positions in a row in 3 matches. We are also the ones who won the most, scored the most goals, and entered the most goal positions in the Super League. Today, we shot 28 times against an English team. We met the ball 40 times in the penalty area. These are not things that will happen with structures. You will work here, you will put in effort. Our coach, technical team, and scout have been working for 11 months. Maybe they can only take 4 weeks of vacation in their lives. One must respect this effort. Today, Galatasaray showed the greatest proof on the field of how it built a team by putting in effort and how it will make its fans happy by training this team well, bringing good players together, and playing beautiful football. Everything is clearly visible on the field. Who plays how, how many goal positions they go to, how many goals they score. The most concrete thing for these is this. You know, it is said to be concrete, well, the concrete things are the statistics,” he evaluated.

News Source: 12punto