Akın Ilkali, the owner of Hull City, one of the English Championship teams, who continues to prepare for the new season in Istanbul as part of the “Summer Tour 2024”, said that his goal for the new season is to move up to the Premier League.
The press conference, which took place at the Riva Hasan Dogan national team’s camp and training facility, was attended by Hull City president and owner Akın Ilkali, vice-chairman Tan Kessler, Hull City coach Tim Walter and footballer Abdulkadir Omur.
Manager Akın Ilkali stressed that Hull City had prepared for the season in Turkey in the same way as they did last year and said the situation had had a positive impact on the team.
Emphasising that when he bought Hull City, he had a dream of establishing a strong club in Europe, Ilkali said, “I met very nice people in a very beautiful place in England. I didn’t expect to have such a good experience. It was a very wonderful journey.” For me, the first year after buying the club was above average. “In the new football experience of my life, the average attendance was 24 people. It increased to 25,000 people,” he said.
Recalling the appointment of Tim Walter as coach, Ilkali explained the goal:
“We have a new plan for this year and the main focus of that plan is our coach, Tim Walter. He was our first choice and the first player we selected because of the football he plays in Germany and the excitement his football creates. And most importantly, he is a positive and good person. ” “All my life I have tried to work with good people to be successful and God has blessed us. We want to achieve even more success with our new coach. I hope to bring success to this beautiful city. “
Recalling that the friendly against Fenerbahce will be played tomorrow, Ilkali said, “I am also in the position of vice-president there. This kind of thing rarely happens in the world, but God gave me such a day. What I can say about our Abdulkadir is that he had a great time last season and will continue to be an important player. He is in the team this year as well,” he said.
“Fenerbahce need strong opponents and Hull City need to test themselves.”
Describing the camp in Turkey as very successful, Ilkali said:
“Last year’s training camp went very well. Nobody expected us to be seventh. We weren’t even in the top ten in the comments at the beginning of the season. I think the training camp in Turkey had a very positive effect on the team. They also feel the change, because they had previously trained in Antalya. This year three parachute teams will come to England and one of them will not be able to participate. “We can beat them with intelligence, not money. This intelligence is in both our coaches and our players. Our project to acquire Maribor shows how high our perspective is. In this sense, we are very happy with the football world. “
Manager Akın Ilkali responded to the question “Do you want Hull City to be promoted to the Premier League or do you want Fenerbahçe to be champions?” “It’s like, ‘You have two children, which one do you love more?'” He replied, “I want it to be both.”
Ilkali stressed that he plans to make important reinforcements to the squad during the transfer window, adding:
“We plan to bring in eight or nine new players. The manager will be inundated with transfer offers. We will play tomorrow’s game without eight or nine players, as our loan players have returned and we have sold some players to the Premier League. The Fenerbahce match is a great source of pride for us, but it is by no means a measure. It is a very important match for Turkey-England relations, for our players to experience the feeling of playing against big teams and for the teams of our two countries to experience synergy. When the league starts, we will have our team ready and our manager believes that Fenerbahce and Hull City are strong opponents. He needs to test himself.”
Ilkali explained that becoming vice-president of Fenerbahçe does not mean that he will transfer players that the yellow and blue club wants to get rid of to Hull City, saying: “There have been strange criticisms about these issues before. They say: “I’m going to take players who are useless at Fenerbahçe to Hull City. I don’t know if they couldn’t understand that I contributed to our success and then moved to another big club. “Maybe it will happen, maybe it won’t,” was his assessment.
Regarding the transfer speculations surrounding Okay Yokuslu, who plays for West Bromwich Albion, Ilkali said: “I like Okay Yokuslu a lot and I’m very grateful to him, but it’s not like we’re buying Okay. But if there’s a problem, we’re not going to buy him. Regarding the transfer, it’s not surprising that Tan agreed with West Bromwich first. “We haven’t reached a clear stage,” please issue a statement.
Tim Walter: ‘I’m addicted to success’
New Hull City manager Tim Walter said he is delighted to be in the orange and black.
Walter thanked Akın Ilkali for his trust and said, “This is my first time going out of Germany. It will be a new and great experience for me, I’m looking forward to it. The person standing next to me (Akın).” “I like to win and I hate to lose. I’ve never played against a top Turkish team like Fenerbahçe, and I’ve never played against Jose. I’m very much looking forward to playing against Mourinho, a good team and a good manager,” he said.
Hull City’s vice president Tan Kessler also touched on the transfer issue.
Kessler pointed out that there are names available for loan in the English Premier League, saying, “There is a regular generation in England, and Premier League teams invest in this generation. We benefit greatly from this generation. This process always happens later. The players who have been invested in a large amount have value to their respective clubs. We are in negotiations with players who match the manager’s philosophy. We are in regular contact with many teams, including Liverpool and Manchester City. This is a big advantage for us. Many Championship teams act on the loan list. ” he said.
Abdulkadir Omur, one of the team’s key figures, also said the adaptation process at Hull City did not take long.
Abdulkadir Omur described the city as resembling the Black Sea, saying:
“The sun is visible, but it’s not very hot. It’s generally raining. Last year we spent a lot of time with brother Ozan Tufan, and now he’s gone to Trabzon. I wish him success. We dreamed of being together again this season, but maybe he didn’t want to go to the Premier League with us,” he said, paving a new path. The Championship is a fast-paced, heavy league. We lost last week. If we had won and made it to the playoffs, it would have been a dream for every footballer to play in the Premier League. “
Remembering that he is part of the national team crowd, Omur concluded:
“I found my place in a big team. After I left, I talked to all my friends. After we won the match against Austria, the team said, ‘Now we can go to the final.'” “We lost in a painful way. This tournament showed that Turkey is back. A good World Cup awaits. I hope this championship will be a rehearsal for the World Cup.”
Safiport sponsors Hull City
After the press conference, a sponsorship contract was signed.
Safiport, the company of Hakan Safi, who sits on the Fenerbahce club board alongside Akın Ilkali, has become Hull City’s jersey sponsor.
Expressing his gratitude to Hakan Safi, Ilkali said, “We took on the difficult task together in the management of Fenerbahce. In a short time, we understood each other well and became friends. I am grateful to him. In terms of sponsors, we are several steps ahead of other teams. This is because in terms of spending limits, the support of sponsors is also very important,” he said.
Hakan Safi said that Hull City is a club with 120 years of history, and that “they gained good momentum after Akkun’s acquisition. We are also a football-loving family. We wanted to put Hull City on the same level as the flagship Safiport.” “Akkun from our group also shared our ideas with us. He liked them. We wanted to be with Hull City. We are investing at home and abroad. We want to be part of Akkun’s story. We want to see our team rise to the Premier League as soon as possible,” he said in his assessment.
After the remarks, the meeting concluded with a group photograph.
Source link
