Fresh off the back of a humbling Champions League defeat at the hands of Portuguese champions Sporting Lisbon, Besiktas welcome Trabzonspor to the Vodafone Park in round 12 of the Super Lig on Saturday.
The visitors, on the other hand, head into the game on a run of four wins on the trot and will be looking to extend their lead at the top of the table.
Match preview
© Reuters
Besiktas' horror run in Europe continued last Wednesday when they suffered a humbling 4-0 defeat against Sporting Lisbon in Group C of the Champions League.
In a one-sided affair at the Estadio Jose Alvalade, a brace from Portuguese star Pedro Goncalves and Paulinho's 41st-minute strike put the Primeira Liga champions in a comfortable three-goal lead heading into the interval before Pablo Sarabia completed the rout 11 minutes into the second half.
Besiktas now turn their attention to the Super Lig, where they were denied a second consecutive victory in their last outing courtesy of a slender 1-0 defeat at the hands of Hatayspor at the Hatay Ataturk Stadi.
In that encounter, despite dominating proceedings and seeing over 65% of the ball possession, Besiktas failed to create any clear-cut scoring chances as Saba Lobjanidze's sixth-minute strike proved to be the winner for the hosts.
Sergen Yalcin's side have now managed just two wins from their most recent nine outings across all competitions, losing six games and picking up one draw, and this has been owing to their struggles at the defensive end of the pitch, where they conceded 21 goals in that time.
© Reuters
Meanwhile, Trabzonspor continue to pull clear at the top of the Super Lig table as they came from behind to claim a 2-1 victory over Caykur Rizespor last time out.
In a thrilling contest at the Senol Gunes Stadium, after falling behind to a Damjan Dokovic penalty midway through the first half, Djaniny converted his spot kick on the stroke of half time to restore parity before Anthony Nwakaeme completed the comeback in the 73rd minute.
This was a fourth win on the bounce for Abdullah Avci's men, who brushed aside Kayserispor, Fenerbahce and Goztepe in their previous three outings, scoring six goals and shipping two in that time.
Trabzonspor head into Saturday's game as the only unbeaten side in the Super Lig after picking up eight wins and three draws from their 11 outings to date.
This has been owing to both their free-scoring frontmen and sturdiness at the defensive end of the pitch as they have scored the most goals of all 20 sides in the division, while conceding the second-fewest with 10.
The Black Sea Storm will feel confident of moving in the same vein this weekend as they take on a Besiktas side who they are unbeaten against in all but one of the last six meetings between the sides, claiming three wins and two draws.
- D
- L
- W
- L
- W
- L
- W
- L
- L
- W
- L
- L
- D
- D
- W
- W
- W
- W
- D
- D
- W
- W
- W
- W
Team News
© Reuters
Besiktas will have to cope without Chelsea loanee Michy Batshuayi, who was hooked off injured after just 25 minutes in the game against Hatayspor last Saturday.
The Bosnian midfield duo of Ajdin Hasic and former Barcelona man Miralem Pjanic will also play no part as they are currently recuperating from knee and muscle injuries respectively.
They are joined on the hosts' injury table by the French duo of Valentin Rosier and Georges-Kevin Nkoudou, while Domagoj Vida missed the game against Sporting Lisbon through injury and looks very unlikely to return in time for Saturday's game.
Bruno Peres is out of contention for Trabzonspor after the Brazilian defender picked up a knee injury in the win against Fenerbahce a little under one month ago.
With 10 goal involvements under his belt, Anastasios Bakasetas has been pivotal in the Black Sea Storm's solid start to the season and the Greek forward will definitely be one to look out for.
Besiktas possible starting lineup:
Destanoglu; N'Sakala, Wellinton, Vida, Yilmaz; Ghezzal, Ucan, Josef, Hutchinson, Larin; Karaman
Trabzonspor possible starting lineup:
Cakir; Peres, Ie, Hugo, Denswil; Ozdemir, Omur, Bakasetas; Gervinho, Cornelius, Nwakaeme
We say: Besiktas 1-2 Trabzonspor
After a fine start to the season, where they picked up four wins and one draw from their opening five games in all competitions, Besiktas appear to have run out of steam and head into Saturday's match with two wins from their last nine. Trabzonspor sit comfortably at the top of the table and we anticipate they will maintain their fine run of results.
Top tip
Joshua Ojele
Data Analysis
Our analysis of all available data, including recent performances and player stats up until an hour before kickoff, suggested the most likely outcome of this match was a Besiktas win with a probability of 42.01%. A win for Trabzonspor had a probability of 32.59% and a draw had a probability of 25.4%.
The most likely scoreline for a Besiktas win was 1-0 with a probability of 9.46%. The next most likely scorelines for that outcome were 2-1 (8.88%) and 2-0 (6.99%). The likeliest Trabzonspor win was 0-1 (8.14%), while for a drawn scoreline it was 1-1 (12.02%). The actual scoreline of 1-2 was predicted with a 7.6% likelihood.
