The biggest losers of the World Cup 2026: Turkish National Team

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Semih Kılıç, who scored 12 goals at age 19 for Beşiktaş, was benched. To keep Semih from playing in Euro 24, Barış Alper was made the center forward, but Barış failed to score or assist in any of the matches he played. Semih was brought into the game in the final minute of the tournament’s last match. Berke Özer, who said the roster was selected based on connections rather than performance and was named to the Ligue 1 Team of the Season, was left out. He wasn’t even included on the roster. Instead, he selected Mert, who had been cut from Beşiktaş’s roster and was a backup at Fenerbahçe. Aral Şimşir, named Denmark’s Player of the Year with exactly 12 goals and 21 assists, was left out. He wasn’t even included on the roster. Instead, he brought in İrfan Can, who had been dropped from Fenerbahçe’s roster and moved to Kasımpaşa. He left out Can Uzun, who plays in the Bundesliga, scored 10 goals and provided 6 assists, and had a 45 million euro offer turned down. To keep Can from playing, he made Kerem the center forward. The same thing that was done to Semih was done to Can. He didn’t give him any playing time in the match against Australia, which we lost. He benched Orkun Kökçü—Beşiktaş’s captain, the player who secured our World Cup qualification, and who had 10 goals and 10 assists—from the starting 11 after he joined Beşiktaş. Before joining Beşiktaş, he had been a starter in every match. He benched Demir Ege, who transferred to Braga for 7 million euros, scored in the Europa League semifinal, and was named Man of the Match. He didn’t even include him on the roster. Instead, he brought in Kaan Ayhan, who couldn’t even make the roster at Galatasaray. He benched Ozan Kabak, who played a guaranteed 90 minutes for his Bundesliga team and scored 4 goals. Instead of Ozan in the starting lineup, he played Merih, who—instead of preparing for the World Cup—was posting TikTok videos, growing a mustache, and then shaving it off. He benched Mustafa Eskihellaçı, who had 1 goal and 5 assists at TS, and played both left back and left winger. He didn’t even include him on the roster. Instead, he brought in Eren, who had been suspended for gambling. He benched Adil Demirbağ, one of the league’s strongest center backs—who had played 2,500 minutes for Konyaspor, scoring 2 goals and providing 2 assists—and Emirhan, who had dominated every match he played in and started for Beşiktaş. He didn’t even include him on the roster. Instead, he selected Twitter-obsessed Samet and tobacco shop owner Çağlar. He tried to turn Barış and Kerem into center forwards, and the national team suffered as a result. In a tournament where even a single point from the first two matches would have allowed them to enter the third match with confidence, they lost both games and were eliminated from the tournament. The team he fielded couldn’t even score a goal. He turned the “golden generation” into a bunch of losers. After all this, he came out and labeled his critics as “chaos-mongers” and claimed, “I’m more Turkish than they are.”

It is disappointing, but even more frustrating is that the coach and some well-established players, such as Kerem and Merih, are very arrogant and do not even realize they are the very source of this early failure. Here are some technical explanations, and in the last section, a list of players who were not selected for the team, and the commentators are very angry about that.

Türkiye’s World Cup 2026 Elimination: A Technical Breakdown

Türkiye became the first team eliminated from the 2026 FIFA World Cup after consecutive Group D defeats — 2–0 to Australia and 1–0 to Paraguay — finishing with zero goals, zero points, and a record-setting 62 shots without scoring across two matches.^[1]^[2]

The Two Matches

Game 1 — Australia 2–0 Türkiye (June 13, Vancouver)

Türkiye dominated the ball with roughly 72–78% possession but generated almost no genuine danger through it. Australia’s Tony Popovic deployed a disciplined 5-4-1 low block that compressed central space, denied Arda Güler pockets between the lines, and funneled Turkish attacks wide where the crosses were easily cleared. When Australia won the ball, they transitioned in under ten seconds through 20-year-old Nestory Irankunda’s pace.^[3]^[4]^[5]

Türkiye fired 30 shots, yet only two forced saves from goalkeeper Patrick Beach — making his debut — who denied Güler’s best effort in the 26th minute before Irankunda countered for the opener^[6]^[7]
Connor Metcalfe sealed it 2–0 at the 75th minute after winning the ball in midfield^[4]
Türkiye became the first team since Portugal vs. England in 2006 to take 30+ shots in a single match without scoring^[6]

Game 2 — Paraguay 1–0 Türkiye (June 20, San Francisco)

Paraguay struck in just 64–65 seconds via Matías Galarza’s 25-metre thunderbolt — the fastest goal of the 2026 tournament — and held on for the entire match despite Miguel Almiron receiving a straight red card in first-half stoppage time for a gesture toward Mert Müldür. Türkiye spent over half the match against 10 men and still failed to score.^[8]^[9]

Türkiye had 79% possession and fired 32 shots, producing an xG of 2.17^[10]^[8]
Paraguay had just 6 shots but held firm with a near-total defensive shape from their 10 men^[11]
Defender Merih Demiral’s flicked header in stoppage time went wide, ending the last gasp of hope^[12]

Core Technical Failures

Catastrophic Finishing and Shot Quality

The most damning number: 62 shots across two games, zero goals — the highest shot total without scoring in any two-match span in World Cup records dating back to 1966. The xG data is equally telling: Türkiye generated a combined 3.9 xG over two matches (roughly 3–4 expected goals), yet conceded 3 while scoring 0, indicating the team was both unlucky and woefully poor at converting even reasonable chances. The Guardian’s data analysis noted that Turkey’s xG per shot was around 0.04, reflecting that the bulk of their 62 attempts were low-probability long-range speculations rather than clear-cut chances.^[13]^[14]^[2]^[10]

Inability to Break a Low Block

Türkiye’s 4-1-3-2 system under Montella is built around intricate passing combinations through Hakan Çalhanoğlu and Orkun Kökçü feeding Arda Güler between the lines. This works against balanced opposition but collapses against deep-defending teams. Both Australia and Paraguay sat in compact defensive blocks and dared Türkiye to go around them, forcing long-range attempts and telegraphed crosses. Centre-forward Kerem Aktürkoğlu provided insufficient aerial or hold-up threat to disrupt defensive lines, and Güler increasingly dropped deep rather than staying as a penetrating #10.^[15]^[16]^[3]

Transition Defense Vulnerability

A structural flaw in Montella’s high-line system: rest-defense gaps allowed opponents to attack in transition. Against Australia, Türkiye committed heavily forward, leaving spaces in behind that Irankunda exploited to devastating effect. Both conceded goals came from rapid vertical transitions against an overcommitted Turkish shape.^[5]^[3]^[4]

Key Player Underperformance

Arda Güler, the Real Madrid star widely seen as Türkiye’s match-winner, took the most shots (eight) against Australia with a 93% passing rate, but scored zero and assisted zero — rated 5.3/10. He himself admitted: “We didn’t create enough chances, we didn’t defend well enough, and Australia punished us”. Kenan Yıldız reportedly arrived to the tournament carrying an injury, and Çalhanoğlu was a shadow of his club form. Montella’s post-match comments acknowledged the situation was unprecedented: “We had 65 shots on goal in two matches without scoring; that’s never happened to me in 35 years of my career”.^[7]^[17]^[18]

Tactical Inflexibility and Substitution Timing

The Italian coach was widely criticized for having no Plan B, C, or D when his attacks stalled. When Paraguay went to 10 men, Türkiye failed to adjust their shape to better exploit the numerical advantage, managing only a handful of shots on target in the entire second half despite a man advantage. Critics noted that substitutions were delayed, and the team continued forcing the same patterns that had already failed.^[19]^[18]^[20]

The Rule that Made Early Exit Final

A critical structural factor accelerated the elimination: FIFA’s new head-to-head tiebreaker rule, applied for the first time in World Cup history in 2026. Previously, if teams finished level on points, overall goal difference was the primary separator. Now — aligned with UEFA practice — head-to-head record among tied teams comes first.^[21]^[22]^[23]

Because Türkiye had already lost to both Australia and Paraguay, even a big win over the USA in their final match could not mathematically lift them above either of those two teams in third or second place, since head-to-head would be settled against them. This rule had a direct and early impact: Haiti and Türkiye became the two teams eliminated after just two matches.^[24]^[23]

Aftermath

Vincenzo Montella immediately faced massive resignation demands on Turkish social media. The Turkish Football Federation delayed a formal decision, noting Montella holds a contract until 2028, while Montella himself remained defiant, stating he is “ready to rebuild with the youngsters” around Güler, Yıldız, and other young talent. Arda Güler told reporters he was “ashamed” by the exit. Türkiye still had a dead-rubber final group game against co-host USA with nothing at stake except salvaging dignity.^[25]^[26]^[18]^[11]^[10]

⁂

Players Left Out for Non-Tactical Reasons

Berke Özer — The Most Concrete Case

The clearest example of a personal/disciplinary exclusion is Berke Özer, arguably Turkey’s best goalkeeper heading into the World Cup cycle. The Lille goalkeeper walked out of the national team camp in October 2025 after being left out of the matchday squad for the 6–1 win over Bulgaria, citing that he felt it was pointless to stay if he wasn’t going to play. The TFF immediately issued a hard public statement calling his behaviour “unacceptable” and referred him to the Disciplinary Committee.^[1]^[2]

Özer himself gave a revealing interview months later, saying the TFF’s harsh public statement devastated him (“I cried for days”), that there was no argument or fight with Montella (“Montella and I were always in communication, there was never any disrespect between us”), and that he had pre-informed the goalkeeping coaches and even teammates like Mert Günok, Uğurcan Çakır, and Altay Bayındır before leaving. He acknowledged fault but described the crisis as being mismanaged by all parties. Crucially, the incident led to him being permanently excluded from the World Cup squad. Given that Altay Bayındır (Manchester United bench player) started neither match and the goalkeeping unit faced no pressure during Turkey’s 62 goalless shots, many Turkish fans have pointed out that Özer — the Ligue 1 starter at Lille — would almost certainly have made a difference.^[3]^[4]

Enes Ünal — Injury and Form, Not Personal

Enes Ünal, Bournemouth’s striker and one of Turkey’s most prolific forwards in recent years, was also absent. His exclusion appears primarily injury-related rather than personal — he suffered a second ACL/cruciate ligament injury in January 2025, which he described as a “catastrophe,” and played only 9 matches all season. By the time of squad selection he was fit again, but his lack of match sharpness after such a serious injury made his exclusion largely justifiable on football grounds.^[5]^[6]

Aral Şimşir — Performance Ignored?

Aral Şimşir, who was named Danish Superliga Player of the Season with 23 goal involvements, was also cut. No personal conflict was reported, but fans and analysts found it difficult to justify leaving out someone in that level of form, especially with Turkey unable to score at the World Cup. He was placed on the reserve list but never called up.^[7]^[3]

Semih Kılıçsoy — Tactical Mismatch

Semih Kılıçsoy (Cagliari), a regular in qualifying squads, was quietly dropped before the World Cup. Reddit discussions and Turkish football forums noted that Montella seemed to have “a reluctance toward effective strikers” and that Kılıçsoy didn’t fit his possession-based mold. No personal conflict was documented, but the omission fueled speculation that Montella’s squad choices were shaped by his preferred tactical profile rather than pure quality.^[8]^[9]

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The biggest losers of the World Cup 2026: Turkish National Team

Players Left Out for Non-Tactical Reasons

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