Galatasaray’s new boys failed to deliver on the European stage, drawing 0-0 with Club Brugge in an uneventful night in Belgium.
The Turkish giants have a new-look side this summer as the likes of Falcao, Steven Nzonzi and Jean-Michael Seri made their European debuts for the Lions.
Galatasaray’s eventful window: Five things to know…
- Galatasaray won the Turkish league last season.
- They signed 14 players in the summer transfer window.
- But they only spent £4.3m in transfer fees.
- Falcao and Ryan Babel joined on free transfers.
- While the likes of Seri, Mario Lemina and Florin Andone all joined on loan from English sides.
This influx of stars meant that the Turkish champions started Wednesday’s match with no Turkish players in their XI, the second time this has ever happened – Besiktas’ 1-1 draw with Napoli in 2016 being the first.
🌍 – Galatasaray become the second Turkish club to field 11 foreign players in their starting XI of a CL match, after Besiktas vs Napoli (1-1) on 1 November 2016. #UCL #Galatasaray
— Gracenote Live (@GracenoteLive) September 18, 2019
However, the new stars flattered to deceive. They struggled to break down a Club Brugge side who would have potentially hoped for more in a game which appears to be their best chance to pick up points from in what is a very hard group.
The Belgian side could easily have beaten the Galatasaray too: Fernando Muslera produced a couple of great saves, as well as Federico Ricca hitting the bar and Emmanuel Bonaventure Dennis wasting a golden-headed opportunity.
Sofiane Feghouli clipped the top of the bar but the Lions had limited chances and will hope to improve when the challenges of PSG and Real Madrid arrive in the coming gameweeks.
Brugge’s unbeaten run in the Champions League has now stretched to five games, an impressive run on paper, but one that has yielded little in terms of chances of progressing into the later rounds.
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