It’s no secret that football banter is frequently relied on to help expats and locals bridge the gap. The real struggle lies in creating the illusion that you know what you’re talking about. It’s a complex league, a long season and essentially impossible to follow all the accompanying results and drama. Unlike other leagues, which can easily be followed in several languages, the Turkish Süper Lig is analyzed extensively in Turkish… but not much else.
Thus, my relief when I discovered Turkish Football Weekly — a consistent, thorough, often humorous and always informative podcast — hosted by Ata Dizdar. Listening to a just a few of the recent episodes is likely all you’d need to be well-versed in the league. Imagine dazzling everyone in your local kahvehane with your knowledge of transfer prospects or boardroom drama plaguing a club.
Ata was willing to take some time to answer a few of my questions.
So, first off, tell us a little bit about yourself and how you came to host/create Turkish Football Weekly. How did you become interested in Turkish football in general?
I’ll answer the second question first. I’ve been interested in Turkish football for the longest time. I only got access to watch the league back in the early 2000s, maybe around 2003 or so. So yeah it’s been a while.
As for the creation of the podcast, I got inspired to do so back in 2009 when a friend of mine I’ve known since high school produced a podcast (now defunct) on Russian football. I didn’t know exactly how to produce one back then. At the time I was writing about the Turkish league for a site called World Soccer Reader. I thought that there wasn’t anything on football from Turkey in the English language, and figured since my friend was producing a podcast, I might as well get in on the fun. Keep in mind I live in the US, and the football/soccer culture here was way different back in 2009/2010 than it is now. So the editor at the site I was writing for knew another Turkish guy, and he got in touch with me, and that’s basically how the podcast got started. It started in February of 2010, which means that next month will be the podcast’s five year anniversary. There have been times where it was on hiatus, some planned, others unplanned. However, the podcast has been around since February 2010.
How many people are involved in the production of TFW and how often do you release episodes? How many episodes do you have thus far?
Actually, there isn’t much to producing it. I call my co-host via Skype and record the conversation. I have an audio editing program that I use to edit the episodes after recording, to eliminate flubs, mistakes, etc. As the title of the show suggests, the podcast is released weekly. Although, should Turkey participate in any international tournaments, like the U-20 World Cup a couple of years ago, then I try to have episodes out after the Turkey match is done. Otherwise, it’s a weekly release. As for how many episodes there are in total, if I include particular special episodes (like our season preview before this season started), then there are about 221 episodes or so.
How do you plan each podcast?
I write up a format every week. Basically, the general format is results (league or Turkish national team, followed by club European results) and analyzing, then the week’s news about Turkish football and analysis of that news. I try to keep episodes around an hour. I figure that’s the ideal time period for people to listen and still pay attention. The absolute limit for an episode is 90 minutes — anything longer than that and people stop paying attention. Special episodes are an exception, and there are times where it’s a slow news week, which results in an episode lasting 30 minutes or so. But generally episodes are kept between 60-90 minutes.
As someone who doesn’t live in Turkey, what are the challenges of keeping up with the Turkish Süper Lig? Are there any reliable sources in English that you’d recommend?
For me, I have a good comprehension of the Turkish language. There’s a few words that I don’t know the meaning of, but at least I can make sense of it through Google translate (even though their Turkish translation is pretty terrible). I would say to check out the Hurriyet Daily News and Today’s Zaman sports sections if one wants to keep up with the league. Of course, the podcast is also a good way of keeping up as well.
Generally, I think people new to Turkey are apprehensive about diving headfirst into our league, especially if they’re already tied to one elsewhere. In your opinion, is there anything about the Turkish Süper Lig that separates it from the rest of world football in terms of appeal?
I would say the fan passion. However, due to the often criticized Passolig system, that part of the sport in Turkey has been lost. I would say people should follow it for some stars they may have seen before and who have ended up in Turkey. There are times over Twitter where I get the occasional, “He ended up in Turkey?” tweet. I would say if one is a football fan living in Turkey, it would be best for people to check out the country’s domestic league. Perhaps not for the quality, but really more to understand the overall culture of the country itself.
What are your predictions for how the rest of the season will play out?
I’m not one to make predictions, because they usually are tremendously off.
Finally, if you were a newcomer to Istanbul with minimal knowledge of the league, which club would you likely align yourself with? Do you have any advice for newcomers to the Turkish Süper Lig or people interested in learning more?
I wouldn’t limit the question to just Istanbul. I would suggest for people to follow the local team. It’s too easy to just associate with the Istanbul Big 3 because they are the ones with all of the press coverage. If a guy lives in Ankara for instance, I’d suggest to go for Gençlerbirliği. For Istanbul, go with whichever you like. Of course, newcomers can always ask me over Twitter (@ata_dizdar) or listen to the podcast.
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Episodes can be found via the official podcast site. Podcast regulars can also subscribe through iTunes or via RSS.
