My dear Beşiktaş suffered badly from the referees’ decisions. Now we see why.

Türkiye’s Central Referees Committee, the MHK, is at the centre of a criminal investigation into how referees were classified, evaluated and assigned. Its chair, Ferhat Gündoğdu, and six others were detained on 29 September 2026. The crucial distinction is that these are allegations under investigation—not findings that matches were fixed, or that those detained are guilty.[dailysabah][hurriyetdailynews]

What the MHK controls

The MHK is the Turkish Football Federation’s (TFF) refereeing body. It assigns officials to matches and helps determine who enters or leaves the professional refereeing ranks; it also oversees aspects of referee training and evaluation. That makes its internal decisions consequential well before a referee blows the whistle: a classification can affect a career, while an appointment determines who officiates a particular game.[bbc]

What investigators are examining

The Istanbul Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office calls this the “Referees File” investigation. It followed a complainant’s statement dated 15 September 2025. Police carried out operations in Istanbul, Ankara, Elazığ and Manisa on 29 September 2026 and detained seven people, including Gündoğdu, current and former MHK figures, and officials connected to referees’ and observers’ associations.[dailysabah]

The reported allegations have several parts:

• Pressure and documents: Investigators are examining claims that some referees and observers were subjected to sustained pressure or mistreatment, alongside alleged forgery of official documents. Reports of the criminal file use terms including eziyet and resmî belgede sahtecilik; “mobbing” is often used in coverage to describe the alleged pressure.[beinsports.com][bbc]
• Career and match decisions: Justice Minister Akın Gürlek said the investigation concerns alleged interference with referee classifications, assignments, scoring, appointments and rules examinations. In practical terms, the question is whether decisions presented as merit-based were improperly influenced.[dailysabah][hurriyetdailynews]
• Exams and communications: Reporting on the file describes alleged messages about obtaining exam questions, pressure over observer assignments, and claims that questions, grading or results at a 2025 exam in Riva were manipulated. These are reported items being examined by prosecutors; the messages alone do not prove the offences.[dailysabah]

Authorities have reportedly drawn on complainant and witness statements, expert findings, telephone records and financial-crime agency data. An investigation using those materials is not, by itself, proof of what happened.[dailysabah][hurriyetdailynews]

Why VAR is in the story

Police also inspected the VAR room at the TFF’s Riva facilities on 29 September. The TFF confirmed the inspection on 30 September, but denied claims circulating afterward that digital material had been deleted before the inspection and then recovered by police. An inspection of the room should not be read as evidence that particular VAR decisions were manipulated; the publicly reported central allegations concern the administration of refereeing.[tff][star.com]

The TFF says it has cooperated with authorities, filed multiple criminal complaints since April 2025 and supplied requested documents to prosecutors for forensic examination. That is the federation’s account of its actions, not a resolution of the allegations concerning people within its refereeing system.[sabah.com]

The broader football context

This is especially explosive because Turkish refereeing was already under scrutiny. In the separate 2025 betting inquiry, the TFF said that 371 of 571 professional-league referees had betting accounts and that 152 had actively placed bets; 149 referees and assistant referees were subsequently suspended. Having a betting account, betting, improperly appointing officials and fixing a match are different claims requiring different evidence. The current MHK case should not be conflated with proof of match-fixing or treated as simply another round of the same betting case.[aljazeera][bbc]

As of 30 September 2026, the firm development is the detentions and continuing investigation. Some English-language headlines say “arrested,” but the more precise status reported in Turkish coverage is gözaltına alındı—taken into police custody. I have not found a reliable subsequent court outcome establishing whether Gündoğdu or the others were formally remanded in custody, charged or released.[dailysabah][bbc]

Previous controversies the Central Referee Committee faced

The MHK’s most consequential earlier controversy was its March 2022 removal of senior referees from the Süper Lig pool—a decision later overturned by the TFF’s own Arbitration Board. Other disputes have centred on leaked referee evaluations, trust in VAR and appointments, and the wider betting scandal among referees. They are connected by questions about oversight, but they are not all allegations of criminal misconduct by the MHK.[birgun][hurriyet.com][apnews]

The 2022 referee purge

On 8 March 2022, an MHK chaired by Ferhat Gündoğdu removed a group of experienced officials from Süper Lig duties while the season was under way. The group included Cüneyt Çakır, Fırat Aydınus and Ali Palabıyık. Accounts often call this the removal of “13 referees”; the more precise breakdown in one review is 12 removed from the Süper Lig list, with Özgür Yankaya moved to a VAR-only role.[birgun][gazeteoksijen]

The affected officials appealed. On 26 March, the TFF Arbitration Board overturned the decision approving the changes. Its criticism went beyond disagreement over individual referees: it found that the reasons for excluding them had not been explained using objective criteria or substantiated with concrete evidence. It also identified a breach of a regulatory limit concerning removals from the VAR pool. Gündoğdu and the committee resigned the following month; he returned as MHK chair in July 2024.[birgun][tff]

That is the clearest documented precedent for today’s concern: who decides a referee’s career prospects, on what evidence, and with what right of review? The arbitration ruling established a problem with the 2022 decision; it did not establish that matches were fixed.[birgun]

The leaked 2024 review meeting

In March 2024, footage leaked from an internal MHK training meeting held on 1 March. Referee educator Hugh Dallas and VAR adviser Paweł Gil were seen discussing disputed decisions in Galatasaray–Antalyaspor and Fenerbahçe–Kasımpaşa matches with the officials involved. Because those decisions were already contentious, excerpts quickly became part of arguments over whether referees were being evaluated fairly.[hurriyet.com]

The TFF responded by publishing the full meeting recording. It said this was a routine educational review, accused those sharing excerpts of removing them from context, and opened an investigation into the leak. The footage showed disagreement and scrutiny of decisions; its existence did not, on its own, prove that the MHK had instructed referees to favour a club.[hurriyet.com]

VAR and appointment mistrust

During the close 2023–24 title race, clubs’ accusations about officiating became so intense that the TFF brought in foreign VAR officials for selected critical Süper Lig matches from April 2024. Fenerbahçe’s then president alleged that an “underground network” influenced results through referees; that was his allegation, not an established finding. The federation’s decision was an extraordinary response to a lack of confidence in the domestic system, rather than proof that the allegation was true.[tff][bbc]

Concerns persisted. In January 2025, the TFF announced another temporary use of foreign VAR officials and proposed changes including more transparent, automated referee appointments and greater access for clubs to performance evaluations. Those proposals matter because they implicitly acknowledged that existing appointment and evaluation processes were not commanding trust.[dailysabah][turkiyetoday]

The betting scandal

In 2025, the TFF’s betting inquiry found widespread betting activity among referees. The federation referred officials for disciplinary proceedings, and its Professional Football Disciplinary Board issued bans for betting offences. This was a major integrity controversy for the refereeing system, but it should not be described as a finding that the MHK leadership placed bets, directed betting or fixed matches.[apnews][tff][tff]

There is also an important distinction from the December 2023 attack on referee Halil Umut Meler by Ankaragücü’s then president, Faruk Koca. That episode exposed the hostility and pressure Turkish referees face, and the TFF suspended league matches afterward. It was an attack on a referee, not an MHK wrongdoing case.[apnews]

The through-line is therefore institutional rather than a single proven conspiracy: contested decisions about selection and assignments, limited trust in how performance is judged, and repeated attempts to restore credibility. The current criminal investigation asks whether some of those processes were improperly manipulated; the previous controversies help explain why that question resonates, but do not answer it in advance.[birgun][turkiyetoday]