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Euro 2008 Player Profile: Hakan Yakin

June 5th, 2008 | By: Jan | 6 Comments »

Name: Hakan Yakin
Date of Birth: 22nd February, 1977
Place of Birth: Basel, Switzerland
Height: 1m80
Position: Attacking Midfielder, Playmaker, Centre Forward
Current Club: BSC Young Boys, Number 10
Club History: 1984-1994 FC Concordia Basel (youth club), 1995-1997 FC Basel (68 App. 11 Goals), 1997 Grasshoppers (11 App. 1 Goal), 1998 St. Gallen (35 App., 8 Goals), 1999-2000 Grasshoppers (54 App. 22 Goals), 2001-2003 Basel (72 App. 34 Goals), 2004 Stuttgart (9 App), 2005 Galatasaray (2 App), 2005-onwards Young Boys (75 App. 34 Goals).
Switzerland Stats: 56 App, 14 Goals

Of Turkish descent, he’s the brother of former Swiss International Murat Yakin.
A player who’s played in the best Swiss teams, he’s not had much luck in foreign Championships. He’s a deadly scorer and has great skills which make him an unusual Swiss player in that he’s very creative and wonderful to watch with his tricks.
His first game for Switzerland was in a friendly against Oman.
He was topscorer in the Swiss League with 34 goals in this season.
Kuhn has chosen to keep him as an other option in attack rather than calling upon a 4th striker like Haeberli.

Hakan Yakin = creativity and skills, his versatility, personality, scoring instinct and experience make him a “must have” player in the Swiss team. And this time he has some great players helping him out in Midfield (Fernandes, Barnetta, Inler).

A wonder free-kick vs. Basel

Tags: Basel, euro 2008, football, Hakan Yakin, Kuhn, murat yakin, Switzerland, Switzerland National, Young Boys

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Comments

By musab | June 5th, 2008 at 12:35 pm

Interesting how his stay in Galatasaray was not really productive. A good player nonetheless.

Posted from United States

By Adrian | June 5th, 2008 at 9:19 pm

Hakan is a player who needs to be papered. He needs to feel the love of the coach and the love of the fans. If you give him that, he’s close to world class - if you don’t then his commitment drops significantly. Obviously, at foreign top clubs, you seldom get papered like that - that’s why he never made it abroad.
However, considering the goals he scored, I believe he’d still be the better option than Streller. Not only is Yakin in top form - but he’s also excellent with standard situations and can play an opening pass like no other in the Swiss team.
Too bad Kuhn isn’t a fan of him. He actually didn’t want to take him to the World Cup for ‘character reasons’…and only included him in the squad when Johan Von Lanthen got injured. And then Yakin was our best man. I wonder why Kuhn hasn’t learned anything from that. Especially because Yakin is much fitter than in 2006.

Posted from Australia

By Jan | June 6th, 2008 at 10:25 am

He’s an excellent player. I think he’s quite underestimated at European level. Although he no longer has the age to attempt to impress the world.

Adrian: I agree with you that he’s a player who needs to be at the centre of the attention although I’ve been quite impressed by his recent form. He seems to understand the concept of being part of the team. I also believe him to be better than Streller and if you keep him up front with Frei it could be a very interesting option. He is a unique player in Switzerland.

Posted from Italy

By Daniel | June 15th, 2008 at 6:20 pm

Yakin is a great player, and a great treat to watch play football! I thought he played superb in this year’s Euro Cup (taking the place of injured Frei).
Unfortunately the Swiss could not pull through to the qualifiers, but Yakin with all 3 Swiss goals of the tournament gave Swiss fans like myself something to cheer about.
And it was nice to see coach Kuhn and Yakin embrace eachother in that last game against Portugal - Kuhn no doubt is happy that he chose Yakin to play again this year eh?
Thanks Kuhn for being a great coach, and thanks Yakin for giving the fans something to cheer about in the Euro! And I really hope Zuberhuler decides to come back for a few more years….Last thing I’ve got to say is:

Hopp Schewiz, Hopp Schweiz!

Posted from Canada

By Jan | June 16th, 2008 at 9:40 am

Hopp Schweiz!
let’s hope Yakin stays under Hitzfeld!

Posted from Italy

By ganesh doha | July 12th, 2008 at 3:55 am

hi all,
Great to know that he is a player who enjoys the love and attention of the coaches. Even more interesting is that he prefers to be a team man. Then he can be happy. Marcos Paqueta, his new coach at Al Gharafa, is a great master and a great guy, who gives least priority to individual brilliance. He is disciplined, knowledgeable and balanced. Hope Yakin makes a big impact on Qatar football and Al Gharafa as a team man.

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