It was absolutely a disappointing season for Antalya after they had finished the previous season in the 5th place. In particular, they have been very poor on the road. They could manage to taste their first away victory in the league only eight monts after the season’s kick off. Had they collected five points less, they could have found themselves in the 1st league.
As they did in the previous season, they were unable to make a good start to the Super League. They failed to taste a victory in the initial five games. The board could not stand to see the team struggling around the relegation zone and sacked coach Riza Calimbay. At this point, Samuel Eto’o and the summer arrival Samir Nasri were unable to meet the expectations.
Then the board appointed former PSG sportive director Leonardo as the new head coach. His arrival did not change the bad run of the team, as they tasted only two victories in 9 games. Unfortunately, they had to change their coach for a 3rd time before the winter break. This time, they decided to wait until the last fixture in the season’s 1st part. The new coach Hamza Hamzaoglu spent the whole break with the team in order to change their mood. His efforts worked in a short period and they started to collect points in order to guarantee their survival. Expecially, they managed to get important results against their direct rivals.
It is known that the club have beeen struggling to pay the team’s wages. Moreover, they faced some problems with the foreign players during the season. According to some authorities, this is the biggest factor for this bad performance. In order not to face the same failure, the board had to solve the financial issues. Then they have to rebuild the squad. If they cannot, they may have to relegate.
