Turkey has lost its chance to qualify for the 2010 World Cup, missing a major football championship for the third time in the last decade. It always hurts to be left out of the party, but it is harder to swallow given the squad's heroic performances at Euro 2008. It is high time that the country comes up with a master plan for football, and a new brain to create it.



Fatih Terim announces his resignation as Turkish coach. AP photo

Turkey is still trying to come to terms with being left out of football’s biggest party, but no one can explain how the national football team turned from comeback heroes to zeroes in little more than a year.

Turkey lost its chance to qualify for the 2010 World Cup in South Africa, handing Bosnia and Herzegovina a chance to play in football’s greatest tournament for the first time. Coach Fatih Terim announced his resignation after admitting that the campaign was a failure, marking an amazing downturn in form for a team that was labeled as one of Europe’s finest last year.

Only 15 months ago, the sky was the limit for the Turkish national football team: The boys in red and white were running riot in the European football championship. Either by coming back from two goals down with 15 minutes left, or canceling out a 120th minute goal by a strong opponent to force penalty kicks, they proved that miracles happen in football.

Until Germany’s Philip Lahm scored a dramatic last-minute winner in the semifinal, Turkey seemed invincible. More importantly, however, it looked like the team finally had something to build on. The future looked crystal clear.

Fast forward to last Saturday, the team at the King Baudouin Stadium in Brussels looked like a pale shadow of the Euro 2008 finalist. It lacked inspiration and motivation for understandable reasons (Bosnia and Herzegovina had already clinched the group’s second spot before Turkey had even kicked off against Belgium), but most essentially, it lacked a game plan. It was not a surprise; Turkey hardly ever had one.

Brought to the coaching job to replace Ersun Yanal in the summer of 2005, Terim repeatedly expressed his desire to work for the long term in turning the team into a “winner of the future.” Even after being knocked out of qualifying for the 2006 World Cup, the former Galatasaray, Fiorentina and AC Milan coach said that Euro 2008 qualification would not be a problem, yet that the real deal was “forming the team for 2010 and 2012.”

Four years on, Turkey still has yet to progress on forming the team of the future. Frankly, it is even debatable whether there is an established “team.” Turkey does not have a certain character or a strategy – even though that was what made the team probably the most unpredictable outfit on the planet. On one day, Turkey could show great character in matching Croatia, one of the most up-and-coming countries of the football world. On another day, however, it could fail to beat Estonia, one of the worst performers during the qualifiers.

Unpredictability and productive chaos on the pitch helped Terim’s cause on some occasions, especially at Euro 2008, but his preference for using various players and ever-changing formations proved to be a failure in the 2010 qualifying rounds. The coach relied too much on the “chaos” approach and seemed to forget that some of the biggest teams of the world are simply great because they cannot be matched even when everyone else knows precisely what they do on the pitch. For example, teams like Spain, Brazil, Italy or even Russia had starting elevens that even a casual football fan could easily recite. But for Turkey, even the most devoted football fan could not have the smallest clue as to how the team would perform on any given day.

Chaos may work well in small tournaments, especially with Turkish players, whose performances are directly linked with psychology. Using forward Tuncay Şanlı as a defensive midfielder would be labeled insane if it were used in a regular group game, but it worked miraculously in the match with Croatia in 2008. But pulling a rabbit out of the hat is not always possible – especially if your rabbits are Yusuf Şimşek or Ceyhun Eriş, two 33-year-olds given their first caps for crucial fixtures.

Terim not only used his chaotic methods in matches. He continuously used them during the build-ups to the games. The 56-year-old never stopped battling with the Turkish media. Once he was asked whether he took lessons from defeats and replied in his overconfident way.

“I don’t take lessons,” he replied. “I give them.”

But truth be told, this is Terim’s way of doing things. He likes battles, chaos and fury. That was how he led his teams to success in the past. Apparently, however, this just doesn’t work anymore. Turkey’s talented generation needs to be instructed with a master plan. The Turkish team needs a strategy. Turkey will always be grateful to Terim for his team’s exhilaratingly heroic performance at Euro 2008, but rallying from defeats to victories is not always the best way. Sometimes, teams need slow and patient play that leads to a 1-0 victory.

One battle has been lost, but there are many wars yet to be won. If only Turkey can find its new general