Fenerbahce president Ali Koc hits out at referees

The club’s president held a press conference yesterday during which he lashed out at referees in Turkey.

Fenerbahce held a press conference which lasted over an hour on Thursday at the club’s stadium in Istanbul during which club president Ali Koc spoke at length about the level of refereeing in the Super Lig.

The press conference comes just a day after the Turkish Central Referee Committee board resigned due to overwhelming criticism. Koc joined his Super Lig counterparts as he complained about the bias shown by referees during games.

Koc began the conference by showing a 15-minute highlight reel which showed many controversial calls against Fenerbahce such as red cards and penalties. He said these “mistakes” were not just against Fenerbahce but other teams in the league as well.

“This is not about a few mistakes. It is a systematic approach to some matches in the past weeks. I don’t think these are innocuous mistakes or coincidences,” he claimed as he voiced concern that Fenerbahce may be the “victim of this deliberate approach.”

He said the MHK, Turkey’s football authority on appointing referees to league and cup games, should be more independent. Koc stated that they supported the continuation of the video assistant referee (VAR) technology despite the controversy.