İsmail Kartal Apologized to Fans After His Team Suffered a Shock 2-1 Defeat Away to Gençlerbirliği in the Opening Week of the Turkish Süper

Kartal, speaking at a post-match press conference, acknowledged the team's shortcomings after the unexpected defeat in Ankara. "The effort and the game were there in a match of high difficulty. We conceded the first goal due to our own mistake.

Okay, that can happen. We needed to play better football to score a second or third goal. We couldn't be productive, he said.

"We conceded the second goal when we were caught unprepared. The opponent's appetite grew, and they started fighting more. That's natural, it's normal.

We lost as a technical staff. It was an unexpected defeat. We all need to draw lessons from this, Kartal added.

The experienced coach also lamented the manner of the goals conceded: "We gave the ball away to the opponent and conceded a goal. In the second goal, one player got between the defenders and scored. We didn't expect anything like this.

We are sorry. We apologize to our fans. Kartal expressed confidence in his players ahead of a crucial Champions League match in two days' time, explaining his decision to rotate the squad: "We trust all our players.

We will play a very important Champions League match in two days. You can't play matches every two or three days with the same players. So we rotated a few players. If you can't give chances to your other players and rest some of them in football, then how far can you go with the same players?