Abdelzaher El Saka's Genclerbirligi walked off 19 Mayis Stadium taking nothing but a sour home loss with them. They were defeated 1-3 against 4th place Denizlispor.

After a good win away to Ayman Abdelaziz's Malatyaspor at the end of November, things looked like they'd start going right for the side that reached the UEFA Cup quarter finals last year. But it was not to be, as they lost at home to Galatasaray, showing a poor defensive performance. Could they resurrect their form against Denizlispor? The answer was clearly no, because yet another bad show at the back of Alkaralar resulted in another home loss, in a match that may have had a different outcome were it not for silly and unnecessary errors.

Long shots were plentiful in the game, and it was Denizli that had the first real attempt on goal, but it went over the bar.

The early pressure paid off, and only 7 minutes into the match, Denizli converted. An appalling mistake from the defence, as they failed to clear the ball. Umit didn't distribute the ball and it was tackled by Ersen Martin and finished with ease. 0-1.

With half an hour of the game gone, Genclerbirligi managed to equalise. The ball was played into the box and Tandogan chested it and hit a strike from close range while the keeper was advancing on him. The goalie tried to smother the ball but it only rebounded to Youla, who made no mistake in finishing the ball. 1-1.

Only minutes later, Gencler went behind again. A long ball was played from Denizli's defence, and it evaded all the Alkaralar defenders. The keeper charged out obscurely with his legs high, but the striker managed to take it around him easily and put it into the back of the net.

Half time saw the score as 1-2, with two mistakes costing Genclerbirligi.

At the beginning of the second half, Ozturk managed to hit a weak volley at goal, and it was latched onto by a striker. Gencler thought they'd equalised but the assistant referee had correctly raised his flag for offside.

After some failing attempts on goal, Gencler were still stuck with the 1-2 score-line. With 19 minutes of the encounter remaining, another Denizli long ball caused all sorts of trouble. El Saka and more to blame, his team-mate Filip, completely missed their headers, and Serhat was left to scramble the ball into the goal to make it 1-3.

5 minutes later, Gencler won a free-kick which Bolic took directly from long distance, but it was superbly saved by the goalkeeper.

With this, Gencler lost the game 1-3, and remained in mid-table, now in 9th place.

EP Ratings:

Gençlerbirligi: Omer 5, Ali Tandogan 7, El Saka 5, Umit 5, Filip 6, Mustafa Gürsel 6 (Min. 46 Ali Oztürk 6), Mustafa Ozkan 6 (Min. 81 Erkan ?), Skoko 7, Ugur 5 (Dk. 63 Gitari 5), Youla 7, Boliç 6

Denizlispor: Hamidou 8, Ibrahim 6, Kratochvil 5, Burak 7, Ozgür 7, Mustafa 7, Güven 7 (Min. 75 Tomas 5), Serhat 8, Mikka 5 (Min. 65 Timuçin 6), Ersen Martin 8, Omer Riza 8 (Min. 43 Umit 7)

Match Details:

Stadium: 19 Mayis

Referees: Yunus Yildiriým, Ibrahim Albayrak, Hakan Atilla Gokbilgin

Goals: Min. 7 Ersen Martin, Min. 31 Youla, Min. 38 Omer Riza, Min. 77 Serhat

Cautions: Min. 54 Mustafa (Denizlispor), Min. 85 Gitari (Gençlerbirligi)

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