Catching up….

By: Musab | August 28th, 2008

After a month vacationing in sunny old Turkey, it’s time to get back to the real world. The past month was pretty intense for Galatasaray. Hearts were shattered, jaws were dropped, and curses flowed freely from mouths. In short, business as usual with the CimBom.

Headlines

1. Galatasaray is out of the Champions league

Let’s deal with the bad news first. I watched the first leg of the Galatasaray Steaua Bucresti matchup in a coffeeshop in Turkey. While everyone had great hopes, they just had to go and disappoint us yet again. In the fourth minute, keeper Aykut took a harmless ball and sent it to an opponent less than 10 meters away from him. 1-0. Minutes later, the Romanians found the second goal after the defense were left watching a long throw. 2-0. Although Nonda scored two great goals to tie things up, the damage was done and despite playing better in the second leg, Galatasaray will just have to make do with UEFA cup action this season.

2. Galatasaray signs Defender Fernando Meira from Stuttgart

Meira is an excellent defender. Hes everything you want in a central defender; hes tall, he reacts quickly to the ball and he clears teh ball properly, not staright into the path of an opponent. If he can team up well with Servet, we won’t be having too many problems in the central defense. Pricetag: 5,000,000 Euros.

3. Galatasaray signs Goalkeeper Morgan de Sanctis from Sevilla on a season long loan deal.

While the Galatasaray board wanted to buy another, more experienced goalkeeper, the board decided it was best to spend resources on other positions that required emergency strengthening. Instead they did the next best thing by loaning Sevilla goalie Morgan de Sanctis. de Sanctis was known for playing many seasons with Italian club Udinese and was part of the Juventus set-up a while back. His experience will greatly help us.

4. Galatasaray signs Milan Baros from Olympique Lyonnais (pictured below being attacked at the airport by the CimBom faithful)

And finally the big one. The Galatasaray board have been working for almost three month to bring a star forward to the Ali Sami Yen, and now they’ve finally succeeded. Everyone knows Milan for his great speed (both on the pitch and on French roads), his ability to get past opponents, and his ability to slam in those goals when needed. All in all, the best transfer in a very long time.