FATIH TERIM:"MY PLAYERS MAKE ME PROUD"

Coach of Turkish National Soccer(football) Team,Fatih Terim was proud of his players as they hit back from two goals down to beat Czech Republic 3-2 to reach the quarter-finals of the tournament in spectacular fashion.

After Arda had pulled a goal back with 15 minutes left, a Petr Cech error allowed Nihat Kahveci to grab an 87th-minute equaliser before the 28-year-old Villarreal striker scored an amazing last-gasp winner.

An emotional Terim said after the comeback: "We've lifted a great burden off our shoulders. We had some injuries that we didn't expect. We had to manage.

"We're in the quarter-finals. Hopefully it'll get better now.

"I'm proud that I have players who know that the match ends with the referee's whistle.

"We showed the whole world what kind of a team we are. We came here to play to the end. We're working to make that goal come true.

"I send a message to my country and I say to the people 'get on the streets, celebrate this victory, profit from this moment'."

AMAZING VICTORY!....TURKS DID THE IMPOSSIBLE

Two goals in the last three minutes gave Turkey a remarkable 3-2 win over Czech Republic in a winner-take-all Euro 2008 thriller on Sunday, earning a quarter-final meeting with Croatia. The Czechs were 2-0 up but Turkey equalised in dramatic style with three minutes to go when keeper Petr Cech inexplicably dropped the ball for Nihat Kahveci to slide the ball into an empty net.
The Czechs looked home and dry in the 61st minute when Jaroslav Plasil added to Jan Koller's first-half opener to put his team 2-0 ahead.
But in an amazing end to the winner-takes-all match, Arda Turan halved the deficit in the 75th minute before Nihat came to the party.
The Turkey captain drew the sides level in the 86th minute when he took advantage of a ghastly error by Czech goalkeeper Petr Cech to poke home into an empty net.
And the Villarreal striker sparked delirium among the Turkish fans when he curled home an unstoppable winner with two minutes remaining.

There was still time for Turkey goalkeeper Volkan Demirel to receive his marching orders for an off-the-ball incident involving Koller, but his team held on to record their first win over the Czechs in 12 attempts. Group B winners Croatia now lie in wait for the Turks in Vienna on Friday.
A penalty shootout loomed if the match had ended as a draw after 90 minutes but it looked long odds against that prospect the way Turkey played in the first half.
They were dreadful and looked a team gripped by nerves as they failed to trouble Cech in the opening 45 minutes. The more experienced Czechs, semi-finalists at the Euros four years ago, looked assured from the off and should have been more than a goal ahead at the interval.

Koller, back in the starting line-up after being benched for the 3-1 defeat to Portugal, was at the hub of most of his team's attacks and he headed Marek Jankulovski's free-kick over the bar when well positioned in the 10th minute.
Turkey's Brazil-born midfielder Mehmet Aurelio had moments earlier picked up a booking which will rule him out of the quarter-final.
Marek Matejovsky, who was carried off on a stretcher in the 37th minute, drew a decent save out of Volkan while Servet Cetin made a great last-gasp clearance to prevent Koller scoring a simple tap-in. It was one-way traffic, the ever-dangerous Libor Sionko firing just over from the diagonal in the 25th minute as the nervous Turks continued to relinquish possession.
The goal the Czechs deserved came nine minutes later, Juventus full-back Grygera galloping down the right and crossing for Koller to power home a trademark header in emphatic style from eight yards out. That was his 55th international goal and the Nurnberg targetman, who will quit playing for his national team after the Euros, almost made it 56 when he nodded over another Jankulovski set-piece. The Turkey players trudged off heads down at the half-time whistle and would no doubt have been given the hairdryer treatment by coach Fatih Terim in the dressing room.

Terim replaced anonymous striker Semih Senturk with midfielder Sabri Sarioglu at the interval, and the change paid dividends as the Turks began the second half well under rainy skies.
Nihat volleyed over acrobatically two minutes in while Tuncay Sanli deflected a free-kick straight at Cech. The Czechs suddenly looked tentative but Plasil settled any nerves with their second just after the hour mark. Moments earlier, Koller had sidefooted wastefully wide with just Volkan to beat but Osasuna midfielder Plasil did much better when he got on the end of Sionko's right-wing cross to prod home at the far post. The goal initially took the wind out of Turkey's sails and midfielder Jan Polak almost made it 3-0 when he sidefooted Sionko's cross against the post from 10 yards.

But it was not all over. Arda set up a tense final 15 minutes when he slid home a low finish past Cech after pouncing on a Hamit Altintop centre.
And after Servet somehow headed wide from close range in the 81st minute, Cech spilled a deep cross from the right, allowing Nihat to force home the equaliser into an empty net with three minutes remaining. Worse was to come for Cech when barely a minute later, Nihat made the most of some dreadful defending to latch on to a through-ball and curl home a superb finish off the bar.

In the final few seconds, Volkan saw red for an incident involving Koller but Turkey held on for a dramatic victory.

FATIH TERIM HAS SEEN THE LIGHT!......

TERIM WILL MAKE THREE CHANGES IN THE LINE-UP AGAINST CHECK REPUBLIC

Stoburn Turkey coach Fatih Terim, finally has seen the light at the end of tunnel and is doing the correct think, in my opinion.

THIS IS THE WAY IT SHOULD HAD BEEN AGAINST PORTUGAL.....

Midfielder Mehmet Topal would replace Tumer Metin would Emre Gungor will start in central defence alongside Servet Cetin instead of Emre Asik, Terim said at a news conference at the Stade de Geneve.

Semih Senturk, who scored the equaliser in Turkey's 2-1 win over co-hosts Switzerland on Wednesday, would partner Nihat Kahveci in a two-pronged attack as midfielder Gokdeniz Karadeniz drops to the bench, Terim added.

And, Tuncay Sanli will move to midfield.

Some rain is forecast for Sunday and Terim said he hoped there would not be a repeat of the torrential downpour that made the Basel pitch almost unplayable on Wednesday for Turkey's match with Switzerland.

'Slippery turf is not always a bad thing as it can give you more pace,' he said. 'We will just have to try to adapt.'

FATIH TERIM: WE AREN'T THINKING ABOUT THE PENALTY KICKS"

Fatih Terim says his side have not practised taking penalties even though Sunday night's winner-takes-all clash against the Czech Republic could be decided by a historic shoot-out.

Both Turkey and the Czechs have identical records in Group A and should the scores be locked after 90 minutes here, the match will be decided by penalties with no extra-time played.

Even though this is both side's final pool game, the knock-out phase has arrived early and while the winners will go onto a quarter-final berth, the losers pack up and go home.

“We have not practised for penalty kicks,” was the surprise answer given by the Turkish coach when asked if his side have taken precautions.

“We want to have done enough to win this game over 90 minutes, but if the occasion arises, my players will do what they have to do.”

Having come from behind to beat co-hosts Switzerland 2-1 last Wednesday in Basel, after the first-half was blighted by torrential rain, Terim said he is hoping for drier conditions.

“The one thing I would like to change from the last match is the rain, I hope we won't have the same conditions as it gets very hard when it rains so heavily,” he said.

“Our team is perhaps not very experienced in these kind of championships, but a hunger to do well is also important.

“We had to beat Switzerland and we did that, now we must do the same.

“We are used to playing under pressure.”

Terim said he was disappointed with the Turkish media in the build-up to the game, who, he says, have falsely reported a row between him and Turkish Football Federation president Hasan Gogan last week.

And Terim said some reports claiming the squad are on a special bonus were also false.

“We see some false reports, there are some reports which make me feel sad and in fact there are more of these reports going on now,” he said.

“It is hard to understand why there is so much criticism going on in Turkey.

“There are reports that I had a fight with the president of the Turkish Football Federation, but that is false and he put a statement on the website saying so.

“Now there are stories saying we will get special bonuses, but nobody has ever said anything about this from our squad.

“Why are we talking about these things less than 24 hours before such an important match?

“I am not happy about this and it is something we will look at when we get back to Istanbul.”

History of fixtures between the two sides favours the Czechs, who have won three of the four meetings between the sides with one draw, but Terim says records are made to be broken.

“I have checked the statistics and generally the Czechs have always been more successful than us in meetings.

“We know the Czechs are very good on penalties, but perhaps the time has come for their luck to change.”

FATIH TERIM: "ARDA COULD BE BETTER!"

TURKKEY'S NEW "WONDERKID"......ARDA TURAN.........




Fatih Terim has hailed the new "Wonderboy of Turkey" Arda Turan as a potential world-beater after the midfielder's stoppage time winner ended Switzerland's involvement in UEFA EURO 2008.

The Galatasaray star capped a man-of-the-match display with a dramatic late strike to seal Wednesday night's 2-1 win at St Jakob-Park and Fatih revealed afterwards that he had long anticipated that the 21-year-old would thrive on football's biggest stages.

"I know him from my time at Galatasaray. He's one of my old students if I can put it like that," Fatih said.

"If anything I had expected him to progress more than he has done. He is very talented but he needs to continue to improve his stamina. If he can do that, I think he can be one of the most important players in Europe."

TERIM also paid tribute to Semih Senturk, whose introduction as part of a double substitution at half-time paid off when he headed in to cancel out Hakan Yakin's opener for the Swiss.

"The substitutions were successful. Semih is a goalscorer, that's what we expect him to do and he did not let us down. You know when he comes on he will make something happen."

Just as it seemed the co-hosts had done enough to stay alive in the competition, Arda broke clear on the left, cut inside and beat goalkeeper Diego Benaglio from the edge of the area with the help of a deflection off the boot of centreback Patrick Muller.

It was cruel for the Swiss, who were left to count the cost of failing to take the chances they had to kill off the Turks long before the dramatic denouement of a match that came close to being abandoned after a torrential downpour left the players slithering about dangerously in the first half.

"It is a wonderful feeling," Terim admitted. "The players needed this for their confidence and I congratulate them on their incredible effort."

TURKEY'S LAST MATCH COULD GO TO PENALTIES!

Turkey's soccer team poses together on the pitch before their Group A Euro 2008 soccer match against Switzerland at St Jakob Park in Basel, June 11, 2008. Back row from L-R: Emre Asik, Mehmet Aurelio, Hakan Baltai, Servet Cetin and Volkan Demirel. Front row, from L-R: Hamit Altintop,Arda Turan, Nihat Kahveci, Tuncay Sanli, Tumer Metin and Gokdeniz Karadeniz. (REUTERS)

Goalkeeper Volkan Demirel may have an important job to do on Sunday.....

If Turkey and the Czech Republic draw their final Group A match in Geneva on Sunday, second place and a quarter-final berth will be decided on penalties.

The Czech Republic lost 3-1 to Portugal on Wednesday evening and then Turkey beat Switzerland 2-1 – both after added-time goals. That leaves the Czech Republic and Turkey level on points, goal difference and goals scored, and according to Article 7.08 in the official 2008 UEFA European Championship regulations, in that instance, if the two equal teams are playing in the last game, their match is decided by spot-kicks after 90 minutes should it finish level.


WHAT UEFA REGULATIONS SAY?...

Article 7.08 reads: "If two teams which have the same number of points, the same number of goals scored and conceded play their last group match against each other and are still equal at the end of that match, the ranking of the two teams in question will be determined by kicks from the penalty mark, provided no other teams within the group have the same number of points on completion of all group matches." The full regulations can be read by clicking here. Whoever finishes second in Group A will play the winners of Group B in Vienna on 20 June. Portugal, as Group A winners, face the Group B runners-up in Basel the night before.

Galatasaray signs German coach Skibbe

Galatasaray had signed with the former Bayer Leverkusen coach Michael Skibbe, the club said on its website late Wednesday. Skibbe, who signed a one-year contract with an option for another year, became the 51st coach of the club.


The 42-year-old new coach will replace his veteran compatriot Karl-Heinz Feldkamp, who resigned in April citing disagreements with the management. The Skibbe-led Bayer Leverkusen eliminated Galatasaray in the UEFA Cup in 2008.

Born in 1942, Skibbe played for SG Wattenscheid 09 in his youth, and then switched to the professional team of Schalke 04. From 1984 to 1986, he appeared in 14 Bundesliga-games, but then he tore his cruciate ligament three times that forced him to end his playing career.

At the age of 22, he started his career as coach with Schalke 04 youth team. In 1989, he became the youth coach for Borussia Dortmund, where he became head coach in 1998, thus becoming the youngest head coach in the Bundesliga of all time at the age of 32.

He gave up this post after being offered the position as director of the German national team. In 2000, he became its head coach. And in 2005, he signed with Bayer Leverkusen which finished 7th in the German Bundesliga 2007-2008.