Today I’m scouting a handful of players from Turkey’s top flight. Each of these players brings something slightly different to the table but all five of them have something that stuck out - a stat or stats that make them a name to know. It’s a feature, not a bug.
Furkan Bayir, D - age 22 | Alanyaspor Kulübü
The 22 year old center back is the youngest player to have the maximum 1,080 minutes played in the seasons opening 12 rounds (only 7/19 teams have played 12 times). There’s plenty to like in Bayir’s SO5 game, starting with his year-over-year increase in starts. Last season was his debut first-team campaign and the kid made 15 appearances including 13 starts and had a handful of big matches highlighted by a 90-point return in a 0-2 away win against Altay when he didn’t have a Decisive but instead rode six interceptions and 83/89 accurate passes to 55 points in All Around Score. He turned around and posted 60+ in another clean sheet effort the next match.
The scores may not be high enough to help you compete at the top of the U23 division, but Bayir is special because U23 eligibility hasn’t driven his price up. The Rare floor is 0.0825 Ξ, which means you’ll need to hit the Threshold a few times to make that back but he isn’t getting any DNPs, you’re not paying *much* of a U23 premium, and he’s shown the upside which may pay off with a tidy profit ahead of another full year of U23 eligibility.
Jackson Muleka, F - age 23 | Beşiktaş
Jackson Muleka is under-performing. I'm writing that with a straight face but the 23 year old is 7th in the league in goal + assists / 90’ (0.81) and the only U23 eligible player in the top 25, and he still isn’t posting the kind of SO5 scores that he put up to end last season. Consider his run to finish the year included a span from mid-February to early-May in which he played 14 games and scored 12 goals with four assists. The AAS weren’t strong, but it hardly mattered.