Galatasaray S.K.

Galatasaray Spor Kulübü, also known simply as Galatasaray, is a Turkish football club based on the European side of the city of Istanbul. It is the association football branch of the larger Galatasaray Sports Club, itself a part of the Galatasaray Community Cooperation Committee which includes the prestigious Lycée de Galatasaray, where the football club was founded in October 1905 consisting entirely of students members.

Galatasaray is the most successful Turkish football club. They have won 20 Süper Lig titles, 17 Turkish Cups and 15 Turkish Super Cups. It is one of three teams to have participated in all seasons of the Süper Lig since 1959, following the dissolution of the Istanbul Football League, and are the only club to have won the Süper Lig in four successive seasons.

Internationally, Galatasaray has won the UEFA Cup and UEFA Super Cup in 2000, becoming the first and only Turkish team to win a major UEFA competition. In the 1999–2000 season, the club achieved the rare feat of completing a quadruple by winning the Süper Lig, the Turkish Cup, the UEFA Cup and the UEFA Super Cup in a single season. Galatasaray is also the only Turkish club to have been ranked first on the IFFHS World Rankings.

Since 2011, the club's stadium is the 52,652-capacity Türk Telekom Stadium in Seyrantepe, Istanbul. Previously, the club had played at the Ali Sami Yen Stadium, as well as a succession of other grounds in Istanbul, which  included groundshares with Beşiktaş and Fenerbahçe at the Taksim Stadium and İnönü Stadium.

Galatasaray'ın Antalya Kampı Başladı!!

The club has a long-standing rivalry with other major Istanbul teams, namely with Beşiktaş and Fenerbahçe.  The derby between Galatasaray and Fenerbahçe is dubbed the Kıtalar Arası Derbi (English: Intercontinental Derby) due to the location of their headquarters and stadiums on the European (Galatasaray) and Asian  (Fenerbahçe) sides of the Bosphorus strait in Istanbul.As a result of the team's 20th championship for the 2014–15 Süper Lig season, their logo hereafter contains four stars representing their 20 championships
for the league; each star corresponds to the team's five championships.

- History -

Galatasaray SK was founded in October 1905 (the exact day is disputed, but is traditionally accepted as "17 Teşrinievvel 1321" according to the Rumi calendar, which corresponds to "30 October 1905" according to the Gregorian calendar) by Ali Sami Yen and other students of Galatasaray High School (a high school in Istanbul  which was established in 1481) as a football club. Ali Sami Yen became Galatasaray SK's first president and was given the club's membership number "1". The team's first match was against Cadi-Keuy FC and Galatasaraywon this match with a score of 2–0.There were discussions about the club's name, in which some suggested
Gloria (victory) and others Audace (courage), but it was decided that its name would be Galatasaray.

According to researcher Cem Atabeyoğlu, Galatasaray took its name from one of its first matches. In that match, Galatasaray won 2–0 over a local Greek club and the spectators called them "Galata Sarayı efendileri"  (English: "Gentlemen of Galata Palace"), and, after this incident, they adopted that name and started to call their club "Galata Sarayı". In 1905, during the era of the Ottoman Empire, there were no laws for associations so the club could not be registered officially, but, after the 1912 Law of Association, the club registered legally.

Among with the founder Ali Sami Yen, the co-founders were the ones who were keen to do this sport, such as Asım Tevfik Sonumut, Reşat Şirvani, Cevdet Kalpakçıoğlu, Abidin Daver and Kamil.Since there weren' t any other Turkish teams, Galatasaray joined the Istanbul League that was consisting of English and Greek teams in the season of 1905–1906. With their first championship title they won in 1908–1909, they heralded the beginning of Turkish football history.

Galatasaray - Real Madrid : 2000 UEFA Supercup FULL MATCH

Thus Galatasaray literally means "Galata Palace". "Galatasaray" is a compound word and it is pronounced as such, with a very brief pause between the two words.There is no diminutive form of the club's name. Fans refer to the club either by its full name or by its nickname Cim-Bom(-Bom)—pronounced of uncertain etymology. However, the shortened form "Gala" is sometimes used by English speakers.

- Stadium -

Ali Sami Yen Stadium

When Galatasaray were formed no Turkish teams had their own home ground, and all games in the Istanbul Football League took place at Papazın Çayırı – now the site of Fenerbahçe's Şükrü Saracoğlu Stadium. In 1921 the city's first proper football stadium was constructed, Taksim Stadium, which was used as the home ground for all of Istanbul's teams. When historic Taksim Stadium was demolished in 1940, Galatasaray decided to build a large, modern stadium. Due to difficulties stemming from World War II, construction was delayed for over
two decades. In this period, they played in Şeref Stadi and Dolmabahçe Stadi On 20 December 1964, Ali Sami
Yen Stadium opened.

Named after the founder of Galatasaray, Ali Sami Yen, it is in the Mecidiyeköy quarter of the Şişli district at the center of the city. In 1964, the stadium had capacity over 35,000. Due to improvements in security and prohibition of non-seater spectators, the all-seater capacity reduced to 22,000 in 1993. A few years later, the rebuilt of main stand, which was damaged by an earthquake, slightly increased the capacity.After 2002, when Atatürk Olympic Stadium was built for Istanbul's Olympic Games bid, Galatasaray started to play European Cup matches there. The attendance record among Turkish stadiums was broken there, in Galatasaray–Olympiacos match played in front of 79,414 spectators. Yet, Ali Sami Yen Stadium has historic importance for Galatasaray fans although it is smaller and older. In 2011, the stadium demolished after Galatsaray moved to the newly built Türk Telekom Stadium.

Türk Telekom Stadium

The new home ground of Galatasaray is the newly built Türk Telekom Stadium in the Aslantepe quarter near Maslak financial district in Şişli. The new stadium, which was opened 15 January 2011, has a capacity of 52,695 seats, making it the largest private stadium owned by a club in Turkey.Officially Ali Sami Yen Spor Kompleksi – Türk Telekom Stadium, is a football stadium serving as the home ground of the Süper Lig club Galatasaray S.K.. It is located in the Seyrantepe quarter of the Şişli district, on the European side of Istanbul, Turkey. The all-seater stadium has the capacity to host 52,223 spectators during football games.

Türk Telekom Stadium was the first stadium in Turkey that met the UEFA Euro 2016 requirements during the country's bid to host the European Championship. In 2011, Türk Telekom Stadium was one of the six nominees for the Venue of the Year and New Venue categories of the Stadium Business Awards. Galatasaray SK won the Süper Lig in the first season at Türk Telekom Stadium. Türk Telekom Stadium and Galatasaray SK were mentioned in the first chapter  of Tom Clancy's 2012 novel Threat Vector.

Galatasaray S.K. - Ultras World

- Label and colours -

Galatasaray's first emblem was drawn by 333 Şevki Ege. This was the figure of a spread-winged eagle with a football in its beak. The eagle was a model emblem that Galatasaray dwelled on in the beginning. But when the name did not attract too much interest, Şevki Ege’s composition was pushed aside. It was replaced by the current design in  the 1920s. This replaced in 1925 by the current "Ghayn-Sin" crest, which are the first two Arabic letters of "G"alata "S"aray, designed by Ayetullah Emin.

At first, the colours of Galatasaray were red and white. These are the colours in the modern Turkish flag. The Turkish Republic, however, was not founded at that time. Therefore, this decision caused the repressive administration of  the day to feel uncomfortable and the administration subsequently pressured the footballers. For this reason, on December 26, 1906 the colors were changed to yellow and black,. The eight-piece halved design kit was ordered from the Sports Outfitter William Shillcock based in Birmingham, United Kingdom. . After a heavy 0-5 lost to Baltalimanı in a friendly match the new colours yellow and black were counted as inauspicious.

On 6 December 1908, for a match against the football team of the Royal Navy cruiser HMS Barham's crewmen, Galatasaray finally settled on playing in red and yellow, inspired by the roses which Gül Baba offered to Sultan Bayezid II. Ali Sami Yen stated, "After we have been in and out of several shops, we saw two different elegant-looking wool materials in Fatty Yanko's store at Bahçekapısı (between Eminönü and Sirkeci in Istanbul, now called Bahçekapı). One of them was quite dark red, resembling the cherry color, and the other a rich yellow with a touch of orange. When the sales clerk made the two fabrics fly together with a twist of his hand they became so bright that it reminded us the beauty of a goldfinch. We thought we were looking at the colors flickering in burning fire. We were picturing the yellow-red flames shining on our team and dreaming that it would take us to victories. Indeed it did."

The Galatasaray home kit have always been fundamentally the same since 1908. The traditional shirt of Galatasaray is the eight-piece halved design. This consists of the shirt’s front, back and sleeves being made up of two colours, resulting in the shirt being split into eight parts. (Two same colours are never next to each other within the 8 parts.)  The colours continue in an alternating order, from yellow to red. This results in the front of the shirt being the opposite of the back and the shirt also having an halved design from the side. This alternating colour order of eight parts  creates a complete halved design for the shirt.

The classic eight-piece halved design would become the look of Galatasaray for around 80 years, until 1985 when sportswear manufacturer Adidas began to provide the shirts and the sleeves were made up by one colour and not halved. Created over a century ago, the classic Galatasaray kit combination consists of the eight-piece halved traditional shirt, white shorts and red socks and are usually worn as part of the home strp. This changed in the mid-1980s, when sportswear manufacturer Adidas began to provide the shirts. The club reverted to the "classic" kit in 2012. The official colours are Pantone shades 1235 (yellow) and 201 (red).

- Support -

Galatasaray fans attach high importance to European competitions, and Galatasaray is known as the Conqueror  of Europe by their fans. This nickname underlines the importance of the UEFA Cup and Super Cup Galatasaray managed to win during the 1999–2000 season. Galatasaray fans also have a reputation in Europe as being one  of the most fanatic in the world, along with ultrAslan. Ryan Giggs once said I've never experienced anything like Galatasaray. Three hours before kick-off, we went out to have a look at the pitch and the stadium was overcrowded! The chanting was brilliant: one side starts, then the other, then quiet, then all of them chanting! The players really
enjoyed it. Before it was good, after it wasn't for us.

- Honours -

Galatasaray SK, a Turkish professional association football club, is Turkey's most successful team in Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) competitions.The 1999–2000 UEFA Cup competition was won by Galatasaray after they defeated Arsenal in the final. The victory marked the first time a Turkish side had won a European club football trophy, prompting wild celebrations on the streets of Istanbul.

Galatasaray entered the competition after finishing in third position in Group H after the first group stage of the 1999–2000 UEFA Champions League, resulting in their transfer to the UEFA Cup, ahead of fourth-placed Milan. Their final group stage victory, against Milan, began a series of victories against Bologna, Borussia Dortmund, Mallorca and Leeds United en route to the final, held at Parken Stadium in Copenhagen.

The final was scoreless through both the first 90 minutes and after extra time. In the ensuing penalty shoot-out, Patrick Vieira and Davor Šuker missed for Arsenal, while Galatasaray's Ergün Penbe, Hakan Şükür, Ümit Davala all converted past goalkeeper David Seaman. Gheorghe Popescu then scored the winning kick to win the UEFA Cup for Galatasaray.Galatasaray had won an impressive treble that season, also winning the 1.Lig and the Turkish Cup.

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Galatasaray - Arsenal. UEFA Cup-1999/2000. Final