Hakan Yakin

Hakan Yakin (Turkish: Hakan Yakın; born 22 February 1977) is a Swiss former footballer who played as a forward or midfielder. He was a member of the Swiss national team for eleven years.

Hakan Yakin
Yakin in November 2006
Personal information
Full name Hakan Yakin
Date of birth (1977-02-22) 22 February 1977
Place of birth Basel, Switzerland
Height 1.80 m (5 ft 11 in)
Position(s) Second striker
Attacking midfielder
Youth career
1984–1994 Concordia Basel
Senior career*
Years Team Apps (Gls)
1994–1995 Concordia Basel
1995–1997 Basel 67 (14)
1997–1998 Grasshoppers 11 (1)
1998–1999 → St. Gallen (loan) 35 (8)
1999–2001 Grasshoppers 54 (22)
2001–2003 Basel 67 (30)
2003 Paris Saint-Germain 0 (0)
2004 Basel 6 (3)
2004–2005 VfB Stuttgart 9 (0)
2004–2005 → Galatasaray (loan) 2 (0)
2005–2008 Young Boys 84 (40)
2008–2009 Al-Gharafa 15 (5)
2009–2011 Luzern 79 (26)
2012–2013 Bellinzona 32 (13)
Total 455 (162)
National team
Switzerland U-19 6 (4)
Switzerland U-20 3 (5)
Switzerland U-21 24 (12)
2000–2011[1] Switzerland 87 (20)
* Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only

Personal life

Yakin was born in Basel, Switzerland, to Turkish parents. He grew up and went to school in suburban Münchenstein, Basel-Landschaft, just outside Basel, and close to the borders of France and Germany. He is the younger brother of international football player Murat Yakin, also a former member of the Swiss national football team, who currently works as a manager.[2] His elder half-brother Ertan Irizik is also a former football professional. Yakin's surname is based on the Turkish word Yakın[3][4][5] (meaning close, adjacent[6]), however as he is a Swiss resident and citizen, the name which he uses is Yakin.

Club career

As a child Yakin played in the youth teams of his local side FC Concordia Basel. He signed his first professional contract with hometown club FC Basel in January 1995. He played his League debut for Basel on 12 April 1995 in the 1994–95 season in the match against Lausanne Sports. He was brought on in the 60th minute as replacement for Alexandre Rey and with his first touch of the ball, just 18 seconds later, he scored the goal to make it 3–0, a header (final score 5–0).[7]

After two and a half years in Basel he transferred to Grasshopper Club Zürich, with manager Christian Gross, but could not establish himself, making most of his appearances as substitute, and he was loaned to FC St. Gallen for the second half of the 1997–98 season. He moved immediately into the starting eleven and so the loan was prolonged, before he returned to the Grasshoppers.[7]

During January 2001 he transferred back to Basel. At the end of the 2001–02 season Yakin won the national Double with Basel and a year later won the Swiss Cup again. He recalls the 2002–03 Champions League Group B match on 12 November 2002 against Liverpool in St. Jakob-Park as the "match of his life".[8] The game was drawn 3–3 and Yakin gave all three assists as Basel cruised to a 3–0 half-time lead as they qualified, one point above Liverpool, for the 2002–03 UEFA Champions League second group stage.[9]

Yakin celebrating a goal for Young Boys in 2008 with Thomas Häberli

His career was then overshadowed by some trouble regarding his club transfers, as his engagements outside Switzerland (Paris Saint-Germain,[10][11] VfB Stuttgart,[12] and Galatasaray[13]) were not accompanied by luck. In 2005–06, Yakin returned to Switzerland, joining BSC Young Boys.[14] In July 2008, Yakin signed a contract with Qatar champions Al-Gharafa,[15] for a salary of around €2.5 million per year.

In March 2009, it was reported that Yakin had been training with the Grasshopper Club Zürich Under-21 side, coached by his brother Murat, in a bid to get fit.[16] Yakin then signed a contract on 25 June 2009 in his homeland Switzerland with FC Luzern, running through to 30 June 2011. In summer 2011 his brother Murat became his manager at FC Luzern.[17]

During the mid-season break in January 2012 Yakin transferred to AC Bellinzona in the Challenge League, the second tier of Swiss football. He played his team debut on 26 February in the 2–0 home win against Stade Nyonnais. He scored his first two goals for the club in the 3–2 away win against Aarau on 9 April 2012.

International career
Yakin in Bern, Switzerland, in 2006

Yakin was capped 87 times for Switzerland, the first coming in 2000. He was offered Turkish nationality before being called up to the Swiss squad, but turned it down for personal reasons. He has played in UEFA Euro 2004, UEFA Euro 2008, and both the 2006 FIFA World Cup and the 2010 FIFA World Cup with his country.

On 11 June 2008, he scored the opening goal in the 32nd minute of Switzerland's second Euro 2008 Group A match against Turkey, giving them a 1–0 lead and he refused to celebrate after the goal as a respect for his family's birth country. However, he missed another chance shortly afterward as Turkey scored two second-half goals, resulting in Switzerland's becoming the first team to be mathematically eliminated from their own tournament within five days of its beginning.[18] However, in Switzerland's final group match against Portugal on 15 June, Yakin added two second-half goals, the second a penalty kick, to secure their first ever win at the UEFA European Championship, 2–0.[19] Yakin finished the tournament as joint-second highest goalscorer with Lukas Podolski, Roman Pavlyuchenko, and Semih Şentürk with three goals each, behind David Villa's four goals.

Under new national team coach, Ottmar Hitzfeld, Yakin participated in seven of Switzerland's ten qualifying matches for the 2010 FIFA World Cup, starting twice, and making five substitute appearances, scoring one goal in Switzerland's opening qualifier against Israel. He announced his retirement from the Swiss national team on 4 October 2011.[20][21]

Career statistics

Club
Club performance League Cup Continental [22] Total
SeasonClubLeague AppsGoals AppsGoals AppsGoals AppsGoals
Switzerland League Schweizer Cup Continental Total
1994–95BaselSuper League95----95
1995–96346--41387
1996–97243--22265
1997–98GrasshopperSuper League111----111
St. GallenSuper League141----141
1998–99217--10227
GrasshopperSuper League62----62
1999–002910--423312
2000–011910----1910
BaselSuper League114----114
2001–022713--733416
2002–032913211634717
2003–04631041114
Germany League DFB-Pokal Continental Total
2003–04VfB StuttgartBundesliga80----80
2004–051020--30
Turkey League Türkiye Kupası Continental Total
2004–05GalatasaraySuper League20----20
Switzerland League Schweizer Cup Continental Total
2005–06Young BoysSuper League2162021257
2006–07311041213712
2007–08322440303924
Qatar League Cup Continental Total
2008–09Al-Gharafa Sports ClubQatar Stars League155----155
Switzerland League Schweizer Cup Continental Total
2009–10FC LuzernSuper League291042--3312
2010–11321230203712
2011–1218421--205
2011–12AC BellinzonaChallenge League146----146
2012–13187----187
Total Switzerland 4291572154714497176
Germany 9020--110
Turkey 20----20
Qatar 155----155
Career total 4551622354714525181

International goals
Scores and results list Switzerland's goal tally first.
#DateVenueOpponentScoreResultCompetition
1.19 February 2000Sultan Qaboos Sports Complex, Muscat Oman4–14–1Friendly
2.26 April 2000Fritz-Walter-Stadion, Kaiserslautern Germany1–01–1Friendly
3.16 August 2000Espenmoos, St. Gallen Greece2–22–2Friendly
4.15 August 2001Ernst-Happel-Stadion, Vienna Austria2–12–1Friendly
5.1 September 2001St. Jakob-Park, Basel FR Yugoslavia1–01–22002 World Cup qualifier
6.12 February 2002Makario Stadium, Nicosia Cyprus1–11–1Friendly
7.13 February 2002Tsirion Stadium, Limassol Hungary2–02–1Friendly
8.21 August 2002St. Jakob-Park, Basel Austria1–13–2Friendly
9.8 September 2002St. Jakob-Park, Basel Georgia2–14–1Euro 2004 qualifier
10.16 October 2002Lansdowne Road, Dublin Republic of Ireland1–02–1Euro 2004 qualifier
11.12 February 2003Nova Gorica Sports Park, Nova Gorica Slovenia1–05–1Friendly
12.11 October 2003St. Jakob-Park, Basel Republic of Ireland1–02–0Euro 2004 qualifier
13.28 April 2004Stade de Genève, Geneva Slovenia2–12–1Friendly
14.8 September 2004St. Jakob-Park, Basel Republic of Ireland1–11–12006 World Cup qualifier
15.13 October 2007Letzigrund, Zurich Austria2–13–1Friendly
16.11 June 2008St. Jakob-Park, Basel Turkey1–01–2Euro 2008
17. 15 June 2008St. Jakob-Park, Basel Portugal1–02–0Euro 2008
18.2–0
19.20 August 2008Stade de Genève, Geneva Cyprus2–04–1Friendly
20.6 September 2008Ramat Gan Stadium, Ramat Gan Israel1–02–22010 World Cup qualifier

Honours

Club

Grasshoppers

Basel

Galatasaray

Young Boys

Individual

Notes and references
References
  1. "Hakan Yakin – International Appearances". Rec.Sport.Soccer Statistics Foundation. Retrieved 14 May 2013.
  2. "A family affair in need of high maintenance". The Irish Times. 8 October 2003. Retrieved 29 July 2019.
  3. Muhammet Altıntaş: Hakan`ı kaçırmayın Archived 27 February 2012 at the Wayback Machine (in Turkish)
  4. Hurriyetport.com: Milli Futbolcu Hakan Yakın'a Vjosa Jusufi ikizler için babalık testi davası açtı! (in Turkish)
  5. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 20 July 2011. Retrieved 6 April 2009.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  6. "Electronic Dictionary, Electronic Translator, Software for Translation for 45 languages – ECTACO UK". online.ectaco.co.uk.
  7. "FCSG Data Hakan Yakin" (in German). fcsg-data.ch. 2011. Retrieved 16 November 2011.
  8. Widmer, Benedikt; Mugglin, David (2011). Das Spiel meines Lebens (in German). rotweiss Verlag GmbH, Basel. ISBN 978-3-7245-1785-6.
  9. "Match report Basel–Liverpool". uefa.com. 2002. Retrieved 12 November 2002.
  10. "PSG complete Yakin swoop". UEFA.com. 31 July 2003. Retrieved 12 April 2008.
  11. "Basel boosted by Yakin return". UEFA.com. 30 August 2003. Retrieved 12 April 2008.
  12. "Yakin follows Streller to Stuttgart". UEFA.com. 2 February 2004. Retrieved 12 April 2008.
  13. "Galatasaray give Yakin a go". UEFA.com. 26 January 2005. Retrieved 12 April 2008.
  14. "Young Boys welcome Yakin". UEFA.com. 10 June 2005. Archived from the original on 14 May 2008. Retrieved 12 April 2008.
  15. "Switzerland striker Hakan Yakin set to sign for Qatar champion".
  16. "Klatschheftli.ch". www.klatschheftli.ch. Archived from the original on 28 March 2009. Retrieved 29 March 2009.
  17. "FC Yakin – the club formerly known as FC Luzern". Archived from the original on 27 November 2016.
  18. "Switzerland vs Turkey match report". Archived from the original on 11 January 2009.
  19. "Switzerland vs Portugal match report". Archived from the original on 26 May 2008.
  20. "Hakan Yakin beendet Nationalmannschafts-Karriere" (in German). FC Luzern homepage. 2011. Retrieved 4 October 2011.
  21. "Hakan Yakin calls time on Switzerland". uefa.com. 2011. Retrieved 6 October 2011.
  22. Includes UEFA Cup, UEFA Europa League, UEFA Intertoto Cup and UEFA Champions League
  23. "World Cup Profile: Hakan Yakin – Switzerland". Goal. Retrieved 28 July 2019.
  24. "Player of the year » Switzerland". World Football. Retrieved 28 July 2019.
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