Hakan Şükür

Early years

Born in Sapanca, Sakarya Province, Şükür began his football career with local club Sakaryaspor, making his professional debut shortly after his 17th birthday. His first goal came in a match against Eskişehirspor on 26 February 1989: with the match tied 2–2, he entered the pitch as a substitute and scored the winning goal; he went on to score a further 18 Süper Lig goals in his three-year spell with the club. In the summer of 1990, Şükür joined fellow first division side Bursaspor. He scored six goals in 27 games in his second season, helping the team to a sixth-place finish, and making his Turkey national team debut shortly after.

Galatasaray – Torino

Subsequently, Şükür signed for national giants Galatasaray. Nicknamed the Bull of the Bosphorus, he scored 19 goals in thirty matches in his first year with the club, helping it win both the league and cup titles, adding 16 and 19, respectively, in the next two seasons and attracting the attention of Torino. In 1995, he moved to Turin, becoming the second Turkish player to ever play in Serie A, but returned to his country and Galatasaray in the following winter transfer window, after failing to settle and only netting once in the league. Upon his return to Galatasaray, Şükür regained his scoring form, scoring 16 goals in the league and helping the club to win the cup. The following season, he collected 38 goals in the league, tying him for second-most goals scored in a season with Metin Oktay, one…

Şükür won his first cap for Turkey in a friendly with Luxembourg in March 1992 – his debut being awarded by German manager Sepp Piontek – scoring his first international goal in his next match, against Denmark, and totalling six in his first 11 appearances. He netted seven in qualification for UEFA Euro 1996 and started all of the matches at the finals in England, in which they were eliminated in the group stage without scoring a single goal. Şükür scored eight times in qualification for the 1998 FIFA World Cup: half of those in a 6–4 home win over Wales on 20 August 1997, but Turkey did not reach the play-offs. At Euro 2000, he netted twice for the quarter-finalists, in a 2–0 group stage win against co-hosts Belgium. During the 2002 World Cup, held in South Korea and Japan, Şükür scored once for Turkey in seven matches, as the national team finished in third place. On 29 June, he scored the fastest ever goal in a FIFA World Cup and in any major international football tournament, netting against South Korea 10.8 seconds into the third-place play-off, which Turkey went on to win 3–2. Of his 112 senior appearances, Şükür captained Turkey in thirty. After appearing in some Euro 2008 qualifiers, notably scoring four against Moldova in a 5–0 win in Frankfurt, Germany, he was not selected for the finals, his last game being a 0–1 home loss to Greece at the age of 36 (17 October 2007).

Club

International

Şükür is of Albanian origin. Both of his parents are immigrants from Yugoslavia, his father being born in Pristina, and his mother in Skopje. His surname is spelled "Shykyr" in Albanian. His first wife, Esra Elbirlik, married him in a ceremony broadcast live on television, initiated by Prime Minister Tansu Çiller and performed by Mayor of Istanbul Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. The couple divorced after four months, and Elbirlik and her family died in the 1999 İzmit earthquake. Şükür fathered three children with his second spouse, Beyda. In 2010, the football stadium of Sancaktepe was named after him. In April 2014, his name was removed again.