Playoff victory thanks to Güler & Kadıoğlu
©IMAGO
The Turkish national team has taken the next step towards the World Cup in the summer. Thanks to a 1-0 win in the first playoff game against Romania, coach Vincenzo Montella’s team prevailed in the semi-finals. For the Romanians it was a bitter defeat in a special game for coach Mircea Lucescu, who will go down in the history books as the oldest national football coach to date.
In Beşiktaş Park in Istanbul, the Turkish selection had to work for a long time to score the opening goal. Despite more than 70 percent possession of the ball, the Turks hardly created any threat to score. In the 53rd minute, Real Madrid’s youngster Arda Güler served Brighton professional Ferdi Kadıoğlu. Güler delicately lifted the ball from the right half of the field into the path of full-back Kadıoğlu, who processed the pass cleanly and was able to overcome the strong Romanian goalkeeper Ionuț Radu (Celta Vigo) for the golden goal of the evening.
The Turks will now face either Slovakia or Kosovo in the final, who will face each other in another semi-final in the evening (watch live here). Participation in the World Cup would be Turkey’s first in 24 years.
National coach Lucescu ousts Taylor and Pfister
Romania’s Lucescu, meanwhile, takes the lead among the oldest coaches in football history in an international match. The 80 year, seven month and 26 day old Bucharest native displaces Alan Taylor, who was a good month younger than Lucescu today when he played as Cook Islands coach in November 2023. The now 88-year-old German Otto Pfister, who became the oldest selection coach at the time for Afghanistan’s national team in 2018 at the age of 80 years, four months and three days, slipped into third place.
To date, the oldest coach of a DFB team was Sepp Herberger in 1964, aged over 67. There are more than 120 other national coaches ahead of him in the age ranking. In the history of the German selection, Herberger will be followed by Rudi Völler in 2023, when he will be on interim duty at the age of 63 and just under five months. Erich Ribbeck took third place in Germany shortly after his 63rd birthday in 2000.
