Guest Post by Rob Lewis
I’m very happy to see giant posters of Slaven Bilic while I walk through Be?ikta?, in Istanbul, where I have lived for the past 15 years. He is advertising a mobile phone company, and wearing a suit – and giant eagles’ wings on his shoulders. So I have made a point of talking to supporters of the black and white team (and my colleague Serdar, who bleeds black and white). They tend to throng round the eagle statues which festoon this suburb near the centre of this vast city.
First, I thank them for having posters of the new West Ham boss up on the billboards. They don’t understand “manager”, and call him “technical director”. They realise pretty soon that I’m a foreign supporter of West Ham, and not some nutter – well perhaps those things are not mutually exclusive. We chat about what Bilic meant to them, and what he might do at West Ham. They almost always say positive things about the guy, and about West Ham.
Back in the 90s, it wasn’t so difficult to see West Ham – I was living in Spain at that time. So I got to see Bilic a few times, and liked his commitment and how in the Spanish idiom he “left his skin on the pitch”. That is something that my mate Serdar stresses: the way Bilic lived the game from first to last kick. He really cared about how the team did. No more slouching in his seat, Big Sam style from now on. We can expect a manager who lives by the sword, and if necessary dies by it too.
A large number of the Be?ikta? supporters have said they saw Green Street Hooligans and what a great movie it was. Can’t say I agree with that one, but they like the idea of West Ham having crazy and fanatical fans. Be?ikta? have got one section known as Çar??, which actually translates as Shopping Centre……… not exactly terrifying, but they have a reputation for being 100% dedicated to the team. They have been fighters in the not too distant past, but they also have an extreme political side: they led the “Istanbul United” fans who formed part of protests against the government in Gezi Park two years ago, which began as a protest about a park, and became a nationwide movement. In fact the president tried to sue them for their actions! He failed.
Then there are some other parallels between our clubs. Be?ikta? Stadium is being totally rebuilt at the moment, just as we are preparing for The Big Move in 2016. Then there is the fact that Be?ikta? have had to play in the shadow their richer neighbours for decades, Galatasaray and Fenerbahçe being the other two giants of Turkish football, and both are in Istanbul. (No team from the capital city Ankara, now a metropolis of 4 or 5 million, has ever won the league in Turkey).
Galatasaray and Fener have about 20 league titles, while The Eagles have only won 13. Of course I underplay the fact that Our Irons have yet to win the league. I prefer to mention the fact that we have won one European final, the same as Galatasaray, while the other Istanbul clubs haven’t. Be?ikta? Jimnastik Kulübü was founded in 1903, just 2 years before us (or 8 years after, if you prefer!).
One definite difference between the clubs is the location of our stadia. There can hardly be a more beautiful setting than the Inönü Stadium, looking over the Bosphorus straits which divide Europe from Asia. Night or day, the views from the stands are sensational. Can that be said of the Boleyn? Perhaps it will be truer when we are in the OS.
So Bilic. He didn’t bring the league to Be?ikta?, but as the fans remind me, he nearly did. They were leading the league until a sudden loss of form with 3 games to go. That sounds familiar, the implosion part, if not the bit about leading the league. Bilic has been criticised for failing to beat the other two of The Big Three during his time here. If he had managed to do that, then no doubt he would have taken them to the championsh?p, and we would not have acquired his services.
One thing that I noticed: the Turkish fans all said that they wished him every success, and they said we were lucky to have got such a talented and committed individual in charge of our team – eagles’ wings or no eagles’ wings.