Fenerbahce president Ali Koc was highly critical of the yellow-and-navy team’s agenda.
“Mourinho cares about fans, interest and big clubs. We are going through a period of crisis with Fenerbahce football. Is there stability? If you look at the 10-year aggregate table, Galatasaray has 718 points, Fenerbahce has 717 points, other clubs have been going through a similar period for 13 years, one team for 38 years. That,” Koc told Hulk TV.
“After I spoke about Fenerbahce…”
“We explained our dream. After explaining Fenerbahçe, he explained the football operations of Fenerbahçe, the structures, processes and opportunities we have established. Mario Blanco submitted a 100-page report,” said coach Ali Koç, adding that he had given Mourinho a 100-page report. “He was impressed by this and said, ‘We weren’t going to go here then, we were going to go to the championship under coach Ismail Hoxha. We had the team with the fewest losses in the league, 99 points and 99 goals, which is unprecedented in history, and we started negotiations in case we didn’t become champions. As we did with team engineering, Mario gave him information about the current team, the profile we were looking for and the list that fit that profile. He said:
“Timing was very important.”
Ali Koç said: “Mourinho’s bombshell was good. The timing was very important to convince Mourinho. Sometimes people complain about slow decision-making. Our sports director worked within the framework of next season’s plans. He was doing his job.” As for what options there are in case of a question of changing the manager, one of them is Mourinho, and if you look at his life, it was clear that he would sign a new contract at Roma soon. There was an unpleasant separation. We decided first that Mario Blanco wanted to work at the club. “First of all, he explained what Fenerbahce is, what its history is, what Fenerbahce means in Turkey, and what football is.” He said.
“I told Mourinho: Look, the clubs you are at have less purchasing power than Fenerbahce. They are all much richer clubs, they have deep pockets and they can buy any player they want. You will come to a club like that,” the Fenerbahce president said. “Our team is very strong and we need to get stronger, but we have taken footballers with potential. We are going to do something good financially and sportingly and we have mixed them with footballers who are leaders and winners with strong CVs. “We have delivered results and explained what we did after we removed the shackles of FFP,” he said.
Mourinho’s salary announced
Koc said he had reached an agreement with the Portuguese coach for a salary of 12 million euros per year, adding: “Mourinho wants to focus only on the field, the players, the team, the opponents and the league. He also wants to be involved in administrative tasks.” He believed in this setup that would allow him to maximise his potential, Mourinho said: “He offered us 15 million euros and we agreed with Mourinho and his whole team for a total of 12 million euros for one year. This is proof of how much trust Mourinho has in us,” he said.
Ali Koc said Mourinho also received an offer from Saudi Arabia, saying: “Fenerbahce as a club and us as the management agreed with him. What happened next? Other clubs showed interest. He met with Besiktas, who are from Turkey. With Mr Saadettin, Saran and Mr Aziz Yildirim we met before all this, we couldn’t make a bid while others were making offers, if you were our coach we wouldn’t have bid. He was waiting for us. After the league ended we contacted him again and he accepted a special offer from Saudi Arabia,” he said.
“He says I gave him 15…”
Ali Koç, referring to Aziz Yıldırım’s remarks, said: “Yesterday Aziz Yıldırım said: ‘I paid 15 and is this man stupid, why should I settle for less? They were openly giving money to the management.'” “This is a crime! It’s a very serious allegation! It’s a very awkward situation when a person who was the president of Fenerbahçe for 20 years openly accuses us of paying for such a transfer. Instead of congratulating the club, he complained against us,” CMB said, adding: “You are complaining about Fenerbahçe, not me. Aziz Yıldırım says I paid 15 million euros, but we gave 12 euros to all his team. I don’t know if the 15 euros Aziz paid was for himself or for the team,” he said.
“I told Mourinho: ‘Look, you can buy up to one player from your management company.’ It’s out of the question for Mr. Mendes, it’s out of the question for Mr. Mourinho, but generally we prefer not to do that,” said manager Ali Koc. “He left to buy a player from the manager’s management company. The Champions League final was decided on Friday, depending on the election results. He left. He was very smart, he gave three messages before the game and the whole world said, ‘He spoke well.'” he said.
He explained his reasons for running for president again.
Ali Koc explained his reasons for running for president again, saying, “Let me tell you why I changed my decision. It is true that I wanted to stay for two terms. We did a good job in strategic, institutional and managerial aspects. Fenerbahce bought with us was not a good Fenerbahce. We will be able to bring continued success. We bought a bad Fenerbahce, although Aziz Yildirim does not accept it. Let me say that it is not an exaggeration, UEFA coincidentally published a report in 2018,” he said.
Will Ferdi Kadduor leave the team?
Regarding the future of their star player Ferdi Kadıoğlu, the Fenerbahçe president said: “There is no offer for Ferdi yet. Ferdi has to stay with the team next season. If an astronomical offer comes, like 35-40 million euros, we will sit back and say Ferdi is very happy for us too.” “We are taking a position that we guarantee Ferdi 100 percent to stay with the team. He would be happy to play for another season at Fenerbahçe,” he said in his own words.
