outside the lines
17.3/Video editing: Ziv Steiner
Turkey as a concoction following the violent events at the end of the game last night (Sunday) between Trabzonspor and Fenerbahçe, in which the latter won 2:3 away and at the end, Fener players quarreled with the fans of the host team who broke into the grass in an attempt to attack them.
"The football flag was lowered to half-mast," it was written in "Milliyet" this morning.
The riot did indeed break out at the end of the game, when the local crowd did not agree to tolerate the rival team's celebrations on the field, but the atmosphere became violent even before that with sticks, drink bottles and flares being thrown from the stands, when one of Fenerbahçe's players was hit by an object.
In Turkey, they visited the referee of the match, Khalil Omut Meler, the same one who a few months ago was attacked by the president of Ankaragucu, who did not stop the match in Trabzon last night.
Shocking: the mass brawl at the end of Trabzonspor - Fenerbahçe
Fenerbahce goalkeeper Dominik Libakovic was punched by a fan and the media reported on fans chasing players with sharp objects, Fenerbahce coach Ismail Kartal told that his assistants were injured during the brawl and his son who was in the stands was injured in the head, but the footballers of the winning team also "contributed" their part to the scandal : Defender Bright Osei-Samuel hit a fan and punched him even when he was on the floor, and Michy Batshuayi who scored the winning goal in the 87th minute kicked another fan "kung-fu style", as they wrote in the German "Bild".
On the other hand, Anis Bardi, who scored one of Trabzonspor's goals, blamed the opposing players: "This is the first time I have witnessed such a scene. No one should provoke such provocations. If you celebrate in this way after a game, you will provoke people and cause problems."
A Trabzonspor fan chases a Fenerbahce player/GettyImages, Huseyin Yavuz/dia images
Fenerbahce fans gave the players a hero's welcome when they returned to Istanbul.
Meanwhile, the police arrested the fans who broke into the field at the end and detained them for questioning, when the Turkish association announced: "Let there be no doubt in anyone's mind that we will take criminal action against all those responsible for the incident, after we complete the investigations in order to prevent such cases in the future."
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Fenerbahce
Trabzonspor