Mehmet Büyükekşi's statement on the 'Super Cup in Saudi Arabia': "We wanted to hold it in Germany, but..."

Turkish Football Federation (TFF) President Mehmet Büyükekşi met with members of the press in a chat session in the city of Osijek, where they traveled for the A National Football Team's away match against Croatia in the 2024 European Football Championship Qualifiers.

Speaking about their preference for Italian coach Vincenzo Montella instead of local names for the A National Football Team's head coach position, Mehmet Büyükekşi said, "We have had a stance since we took office. Up until now, it has always been a continuation of the past. Innovations have not been made, or there has been a slight delay in making innovations. Or there was no courage. We are aware of this right now, and we are making an effort and striving in every subject to see how it could be better. We want to do new things. Let's talk about this independently of individuals again. The coaches whose names were mentioned have already served in the national team before. Some were successful, some were unsuccessful. If we had brought the same coaches again, what difference would it have made?"

Emphasizing that they have to think about the future of Turkish football, Büyükekşi continued as follows:

"We have introduced an academy requirement for clubs, and we are also training coaches. Three weeks ago, we made a protocol with the Ministry of National Education and the Ministry of Youth and Sports. Currently, there are no physical education teachers in primary schools; there are classroom teachers. In physical education classes, there is mostly no physical education. We selected 16 provinces. Among these, there are those with Super Lig teams, and there are cities like Bursa where football is more popular. We will select a total of 320-350 pilot schools, 20 from each city. We will provide free 16-hour training for Grassroots, which is the first stage of coaching, to approximately 3500 teachers. 12 hours of this training will be online, and 4 hours will be face-to-face. In this way, we will reach 100 thousand children, regardless of gender. We have 14 regions. We are restructuring all of them. We will hire nearly 40 scouts and coaches for these regions. Our regional coaches will review the talented students identified by the teachers we have trained and direct them to teams. There is physical education in middle schools. Similarly, we will provide training to 3500 physical education teachers to give them the C Coaching license. We will reach 100 thousand children with them as well. Thus, we will reach 200 thousand children between the ages of 6-13."

Explaining that football departments will be opened within sports high schools, Büyükekşi said, "A child who is in the youth academies of our clubs and has set their mind on becoming a professional football player will receive education at a Football Vocational High School, but will go to school one day a week. This also exists abroad. At that time, they will train twice a day, in the morning and in the afternoon. This will be for players playing in the academies of Super Lig and 1st League clubs across Turkey."

"WE WANT A NATIONAL TEAM THAT CAN ACHIEVE A CERTAIN SUCCESS"

Underlining that they aim for sustainable success, TFF President Mehmet Büyükekşi stated, "We beat Croatia, but we don't want this to be a coincidence. The Turkish National Team should now be a team that participates in every World Cup and every European Football Championship. It has been 21 years since we participated in the World Cup. We want a national team that can participate in all of them and achieve a certain level of success."

Büyükekşi also announced that they will launch a new campaign in the Super Lig against swearing, violence, and throwing foreign objects onto the pitch.

"WE ARE LAYING THE FOUNDATIONS FOR 9 YEARS FROM NOW"

Stating that they have signed off on innovations in many aspects in professional and amateur leagues, Mehmet Büyükekşi shared the following views:

"We introduced a requirement to play 3 players under the age of 22 in the BAL (Regional Amateur League). 45 minutes in the starting 11. A requirement to play 2 players in the 3rd League, and 1 player under the age of 23 in the 2nd League. Here, we introduced a requirement for teams to play nearly 2 thousand players under the age of 23. Hopefully, if it is successful, we will increase it by one next year. We will bring it to the 1st League and the Super Lig if we can agree. But the Super Lig wants 11 foreigners. If you integrate the pieces, we are laying the foundations for 9 years from now. We want sustainable success."

"PLAYING A MATCH IN SAUDI ARABIA IS ALSO VERY VALUABLE IN TERMS OF IMAGE"

Mehmet Büyükekşi said that playing the TFF Super Cup match, which will be played between the last champion Galatasaray and Fenerbahçe, who took the Turkish Cup to their museum, in Saudi Arabia will contribute to the brand value of Turkish football.

Underlining that they are carrying out this process together with the clubs, Büyükekşi used the following expressions:

"They ask 'Why will the Super Cup match be played in Saudi Arabia?' We first talked to our clubs, they said they wanted it. Upon this, we started negotiations with Saudi Arabia. Currently, playing a match in Saudi Arabia is very valuable not only economically but also in terms of image. Neymar, Ronaldo, and many world stars are playing in Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia has made a 5-year agreement with the Italians and the Spanish. Our referee Halil Umut Meler also officiated a match in Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia has become a candidate for the 2034 FIFA World Cup. They will likely get it by 90 percent. We also announced our support. We wanted to hold the Super Cup in Germany. Germany did not allow the match between two Turkish teams due to security concerns. We said let's hold it in England. The same situation... No European country allows it. Azerbaijan says, 'Come and hold it with us,' but there is no money there either. Saudi Arabia is transferring world stars to its country by paying money like 120 million dollars. Organizing the Super Cup in Saudi Arabia will be beneficial for the brand value of Turkish football."

Stating that they have not yet made an agreement with Saudi Arabia, Büyükekşi said, "Do not believe what others say that you have not heard from us. There is no problem on the side of our clubs, but we are after how we can provide more returns to our clubs. We are making countries compete for this. Maybe we won't be able to reach an agreement with Saudi Arabia. Then what will I tell the public about something that has not happened or finished? Some segments also criticize whether the Super Cup match is played on December 30. We asked our clubs about this too, and they accepted. Even footballers play on December 31. They said we need to move past these now. If we reach an agreement with Saudi Arabia, we will announce it. How we agreed, what we did. We will say it will have these advantages. It is not something that is happening for the first time. A Super Cup final was played in Qatar before. We are striving for both the image of Turkish football and the Super Lig, and for our teams to benefit more economically."

"REFEREE ERRORS ARE NOT UNIQUE TO TURKEY"

Mehmet Büyükekşi also responded to the criticisms made about referee errors. Stating that these errors are also experienced in other countries, Büyükekşi said:

"Referee errors are not unique to Turkey. In recent days, in the Liverpool-Tottenham match in England, the assistant referee raised the flag for offside on the goal scored by Liverpool. However, the referees in the VAR did not see this flag, and thinking that the referee had also awarded the goal, they said 'The decision is correct' through the earpiece. When the referees in the VAR realized that the goal was canceled, it was too late. As a result of a big mistake, Liverpool's goal was not counted. We established a Referee Academy. We gave a raise to our referees whose salaries had not been raised for 7 years. We gave a raise to their per-match fees. There was a system like this. When the MHK (Central Referee Board) changes, all of the Provincial Referee Presidents of 81 provinces change. The newly arrived MHK president changes them all. He has the authority, he appoints them because. We have now changed this. We changed the instruction. From now on, the first referee board presidents will not be by appointment. We are announcing an exam. First, they will apply. Then they take a written exam. Then they take psychotechnical tests and then an interview. The interview is conducted by a board. After that, when that referee earns the right to come there, they will stay there for two years. No one will be able to change them. Two years later, the same thing will happen. We lowered the age of starting refereeing to 15. We will start psychotechnical tests from the very beginning. All of these rules are rules set by the UEFA convention. We are acting accordingly. It is not possible for some things to happen overnight. Time is needed. We have 4 referees that we promoted from the 1st League. All the others are old referees. On the other hand, we are eliminating them. So far, we have eliminated about 5. There will be a classification again in December. Some will go up again, some will fall. We are rejuvenating. But we don't have patience. We always have thoughts in the back of our minds as if a conspiracy is being made against us."

"WE ARE APPOINTING A REFEREE COACH"

Expressing that they are working to make refereeing attractive, Büyükekşi noted the following:

"Europe is having a big problem finding new referees. There is a shortage of 50 thousand referees in Europe. There should be 270 thousand referees, there are 220 thousand referees. We are getting support from UEFA, and we are starting in Turkey as well. They will start in Europe. We will cooperate with universities for encouraging advertisements and announcements to make refereeing attractive. We have a foreign coach for our VAR refereeing. He is UEFA's best VAR referee educator. He comes every two weeks, stays for 4-5 days. They watch the matches together with our VAR referees. Immediately after the match, he shows our referee where they did right and where they did wrong. We also brought a foreign Dutch coach for performance measurement. There is a very big improvement in the fitness performance of our referees between August and this month. All the work and training of the referees are followed with digital watches. We have one more project. We are appointing a referee coach. We will give 2 or 3 referees to this referee coach. This referee coach will follow the referee's match live or on television and have the analysis expert extract the referee's mistakes. One or two days later, the referee will come to the academy. Here, the referee and the referee coach will watch that match again together. He will show the mistakes the referee made. He will explain what they should do. This will be done regularly every week. It will be one-on-one training."

"WE ARE SHARING EVERYTHING JOINTLY WITH ITALY"

Speaking about the fact that they will jointly organize the 2032 European Football Championship with Italy, Büyükekşi explained this process.

Stating that they are making a very big preparation, Büyükekşi used the following expressions:

"There is the bureaucracy of the job. A bureaucracy that starts from the President and continues. The President says, 'If the championship is held in our country, I will not take any taxes or anything else on other issues. We sign by committing that we will solve all kinds of problems from its security to its cleaning and traffic for it to be held in our country. After that, 21-22, how many ministers there are then, they all sign in their own field. I sign too. Dozens, hundreds of files. After that, it is not enough, where will the match be played, for example, it will be played in Kayseri. The Governor of Kayseri signs, the Mayor of Kayseri signs. After that, he asks for the project of those stadiums. All of them are signed one by one. The signature of the architects... It is signed again, such as whether it is suitable for UEFA European standards, how many minutes it takes to evacuate the spectators in this stadium. Preparing all of these has both a burden and a financial cost. We did these for both the EURO 2028 candidacy and the EURO 2032 candidacy. I went to all of UEFA's events. I went to FIFA's Ordinary Elective Congress in Rwanda. There, countries that want to enter the FIFA Board of Directors ask us for votes. We also have our EURO 2028 and 2032 candidacy. I say, 'I will vote for you, but will you vote for us?' I met with all of them one by one. First, we tried to increase the relations and dialogues between the countries. We made an effort for them to support us.
Later, the Italians came to Istanbul and made us an offer for the EURO 2032 joint candidacy. We are sharing everything jointly with Italy. Everyone needs to finish their preparations by 2026."

Finally, emphasizing that the work for the new logo, anthem, and website for the Trendyol Super Lig is continuing, President Büyükekşi said, "We have a new logo study for the Super Lig on one hand. We have an anthem study. On the other hand, we have a 3D website study. We have a goal of generating income from there. We are trying to get these ready by January 1st."

News Source: AA