Jose Mourinho is very rarely out of the headlines and the Special One is in the spotlight once again after Fenerbache’s 0-0 derby draw with Galatasaray, albeit for a pleasantly surprising reason.
Mourinho‘s side picked up a credible point against their biggest rivals in the Turkish capital of Istanbul but still find themselves trailing their neighbours at the top of the table by six points after 24 matches. In a bid to reduce the risk of any refereeing controversy during the game, the Turkish FA opted to draft in foreign referee Slavko Vincic to officiate the fixture and post-match footage shared on social media showed Mourinho making his way to the Slovenian’s changing room to wholeheartedly thank him for his performance.
At the press conference after the game, the Portuguese icon revealed: “After the match I went to the referee’s room. I said to Slavko Vincic, ‘Thank you for coming here and refereeing this big match’. The Turkish referee was there too. Then I turned to him and said, ‘If a Turkish referee had refereed this match, it would have been a disaster’.
The game itself saw a total of seven yellow cards dished out, but trouble away from the pitch could land Fenerbahce in big trouble with the football authorities ahead of Rangers‘ visit to the Ulker Stadium just 10 days away. The travelling away support were housed by Galatasaray in the top tier at the RAMS Park, and the match had to be stopped momentarily be when Fenerbahce fans launched pyrotechnics into home fans in the section below.
A remarkable 30,000 police offers were reportedly on duty at Monday night’s powderkeg fixture, which has regularly been overshadowed with drama off the field instead of on it. Fenerbache travel to Gaziantep in the Turkish Cup on Thursday before hosting Antalyasor in the league on Sunday, with the first leg of their Europa League last 16 with Barry Ferguson‘s Gers coming in Istanbul four days later.