Hakan Yakin facts for kids

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Hakan Yakin

Yakin in 2006
Personal information
Full name	Hakan Yakin
Date of birth	(1977-02-22) 22 February 1977 (age 48)
Place of birth	Basel, Switzerland
Height	1.80 m
Playing position	Second striker Attacking midfielder
Youth career
1984–1994	Concordia Basel
Senior career*
Years	Team	Apps†	(Gls)†
1994–1995	Concordia Basel
1995–1997	Basel	67	(14)
1997–1998	Grasshoppers	11	(1)
1998–1999	→ St. Gallen (loan)	35	(8)
1999–2001	Grasshoppers	54	(22)
2001–2003	Basel	67	(30)
2003	Paris Saint-Germain	0	(0)
2004	Basel	6	(3)
2004–2005	VfB Stuttgart	9	(0)
2004–2005	→ Galatasaray (loan)	2	(0)
2005–2008	Young Boys	84	(40)
2008–2009	Al-Gharafa	15	(5)
2009–2011	Luzern	79	(26)
2012–2013	Bellinzona	32	(13)
Total		455	(162)
National team
2000–2011	Switzerland	87	(20)
Teams managed
2014–2015	Zug 94
2016	Gallen (U18)
2016	Gallen (U21)
2017	Schaffhausen (assistant)
2017	Grasshoppers (assistant)
2019–2022	Schaffhausen (assistant)
2021	Schaffhausen (caretaker)
2022–2023	Schaffhausen
2023–2024	İstanbulspor
Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only. † Appearances (Goals).

Hakan Yakin (Turkish: Hakan Yakın; born 22 February 1977) is a Swiss professional football manager and former player who last coached İstanbulspor in Turkey. Having spent the majority of his playing career as a forward or attacking midfielder, Yakin spent most of his playing career in the domestic league with brief forays into other leagues. He represented Switzerland national team for eleven years, garnering 87 caps and scoring 20 goals.

Early and personal life

Hakan Yakin was born on 22 February 1977 in Basel, Switzerland, to Turkish parents. He grew up and went to school in suburban Münchenstein, Basel-Landschaft, just outside Basel, and close to the borders of France and Germany. He is the younger brother of international football player Murat Yakin, also a former member of the Switzerland national team, who currently works as a manager. His elder half-brother Ertan Irizik is also a former football professional. Yakin's surname is based on the Turkish word Yakın (meaning close, adjacent), however as he is a Swiss resident and citizen, the name which he uses is Yakin.

Club career

As a child, Yakin played in the youth teams of his local side Concordia Basel. He signed his first professional contract with hometown club Basel in January 1995. He played his League debut for Basel on 12 April 1995 in the 1994–95 season in the match against Lausanne. He was brought on in the 60th minute as replacement for Alexandre Rey and with his first touch of the ball, just 18 seconds later, he scored the goal to make it 3–0, a header (final score 5–0).

After two and a half years in Basel, he transferred to Grasshoppers, with manager Christian Gross, but could not establish himself, making most of his appearances as substitute, and he was loaned to St. Gallen for the second half of the 1997–98 season. He moved immediately into the starting eleven and so the loan was prolonged, before he returned to the Grasshoppers.

During January 2001, he transferred back to Basel. At the end of the 2001–02 season Yakin won the national Double with Basel and a year later won the Swiss Cup again. He recalls the 2002–03 Champions League Group B match on 12 November 2002 against Liverpool in St. Jakob-Park as the "match of his life". The game was drawn 3–3 and Yakin gave all three assists as Basel cruised to a 3–0 half-time lead as they qualified, one point above Liverpool, for the 2002–03 UEFA Champions League second group stage.

Curiosity during the championship play-off round of their 2002–03 season was, that in the home match in the St. Jakob-Park on 19 April 2003, Yakin had a good game and scored a perfect hat-trick during the first half of the game as Basel won 3–0 against Young Boys. Yakin showed his other side in the return match in the Stadion Neufeld in Bern one week later. As YB went a goal up he lost his temper and kicked the ball away, thus collecting a yellow card. Just ten minutes later he committed a rough foul and collecting a second yellow, thus yellow/red, to be sent-off.

Yakin celebrating a goal for Young Boys in 2008 with Thomas Häberli

His career was then overshadowed by some trouble regarding his club transfers, as his engagements outside Switzerland (Paris Saint-Germain, VfB Stuttgart, and Galatasaray) were not accompanied by luck. In 2005–06, Yakin returned to Switzerland, joining BSC Young Boys. In July 2008, Yakin signed a contract with Qatar champions Al-Gharafa, for a salary of around €2.5 million per year.

In March 2009, it was reported that Yakin had been training with the Grasshoppers Under-21 side, coached by his brother Murat, in a bid to get fit. Yakin then signed a contract on 25 June 2009 in his homeland Switzerland with FC Luzern, running through to 30 June 2011. In summer 2011 his brother Murat became his manager at FC Luzern.

During the mid-season break in January 2012 Yakin transferred to Bellinzona in the Challenge League, the second tier of Swiss football. He played his team debut on 26 February in the 2–0 home win against Stade Nyonnais. He scored his first two goals for the club in the 3–2 away win against Aarau on 9 April 2012.

International career

Yakin in Bern, Switzerland, in 2006

Yakin was capped 87 times for Switzerland, the first coming in 2000. He was offered Turkish nationality before being called up to the Swiss squad, but turned it down for personal reasons. He has played in UEFA Euro 2004, UEFA Euro 2008 and both the 2006 FIFA World Cup and the 2010 FIFA World Cup with his country.

On 11 June 2008, he scored the opening goal in the 32nd minute of Switzerland's second Euro 2008 Group A match against Turkey, giving them a 1–0 lead and he refused to celebrate after the goal, out of respect for his family's birth country. However, he missed another chance shortly afterward as Turkey scored two second-half goals, resulting in Switzerland's becoming the first team to be mathematically eliminated from their own tournament within five days of its beginning. However, in Switzerland's final group match against Portugal on 15 June, Yakin added two second-half goals, the second a penalty kick, to secure their first ever win at the UEFA European Championship, 2–0. Yakin finished the tournament as joint-second highest goalscorer with Lukas Podolski, Roman Pavlyuchenko, and Semih Şentürk with three goals each, behind David Villa's four goals.

Under new national team coach, Ottmar Hitzfeld, Yakin participated in seven of Switzerland's ten qualifying matches for the 2010 FIFA World Cup, starting twice and making five substitute appearances, scoring one goal in Switzerland's opening qualifier against Israel. He announced his retirement from the Switzerland national team on 4 October 2011.

Coaching career

He was hired as an assistant coach to his brother Murat at Schaffhausen in 2019. After Murat was hired as the manager of the Switzerland national football team in August 2021, Hakan served as a caretaker manager for Schaffhausen for 3 games. He returned to being assistant coach for the remainder of the season under Martin Andermatt. Together, they coached Schaffhausen to a second place finish in the 2021–22 Swiss Challenge League, but missed out on promotion in the promotion playoff.

On 4 June 2022, he was confirmed as the new head coach at Schaffhausen, as Andermatt's contract was not renewed. This appointment is contingent on Yakin entering the course to receive his UEFA Pro Licence. As a result, he was briefly removed from the sidelines, but was later confirmed as head coach on 5 September 2022. On 20 May 2023, he departed Schaffhausen, following a 2–0 loss to Aarau. Due to middling results in his first season as head coach, the club had decided not to renew his contract for the coming season. For personal reasons, Yakin stepped down from his post for the last two games of the season.

Career statistics

Club

International goals

Scores and results list Switzerland's goal tally first.

#	Date	Venue	Opponent	Score	Result	Competition
1.	19 February 2000	Sultan Qaboos Sports Complex, Muscat	Oman	4–1	4–1	Friendly
2.	26 April 2000	Fritz-Walter-Stadion, Kaiserslautern	Germany	1–0	1–1	Friendly
3.	16 August 2000	Espenmoos, St. Gallen	Greece	2–2	2–2	Friendly
4.	15 August 2001	Ernst-Happel-Stadion, Vienna	Austria	2–1	2–1	Friendly
5.	1 September 2001	St. Jakob-Park, Basel	Yugoslavia	1–0	1–2	2002 World Cup qualifier
6.	12 February 2002	Makario Stadium, Nicosia	Cyprus	1–1	1–1	Friendly
7.	13 February 2002	Tsirion Stadium, Limassol	Hungary	2–0	2–1	Friendly
8.	21 August 2002	St. Jakob-Park, Basel	Austria	1–1	3–2	Friendly
9.	8 September 2002	St. Jakob-Park, Basel	Georgia	2–1	4–1	Euro 2004 qualifier
10.	16 October 2002	Lansdowne Road, Dublin	Republic of Ireland	1–0	2–1	Euro 2004 qualifier
11.	12 February 2003	Nova Gorica Sports Park, Nova Gorica	Slovenia	1–0	5–1	Friendly
12.	11 October 2003	St. Jakob-Park, Basel	Republic of Ireland	1–0	2–0	Euro 2004 qualifier
13.	28 April 2004	Stade de Genève, Geneva	Slovenia	2–1	2–1	Friendly
14.	8 September 2004	St. Jakob-Park, Basel	Republic of Ireland	1–1	1–1	2006 World Cup qualifier
15.	13 October 2007	Letzigrund, Zurich	Austria	2–1	3–1	Friendly
16.	11 June 2008	St. Jakob-Park, Basel	Turkey	1–0	1–2	Euro 2008
17.	15 June 2008	St. Jakob-Park, Basel	Portugal	1–0	2–0	Euro 2008
18.				2–0
19.	20 August 2008	Stade de Genève, Geneva	Cyprus	2–0	4–1	Friendly
20.	6 September 2008	Ramat Gan Stadium, Ramat Gan	Israel	1–0	2–2	2010 World Cup qualifier

Managerial

Managerial record by team and tenure

Team	Nat.	From	To	Record
				G	W	D	L	Win %
Schaffhausen (Caretaker)		12 August 2021	31 August 2021	&&&&&&&&&&&&&&03.&&&&&03	&&&&&&&&&&&&&&02.&&&&&02	&&&&&&&&&&&&&&01.&&&&&01	&&&&&&&&&&&&&&00.&&&&&00	&&&&&&&&&&&&&066.67000066.67
Schaffhausen		4 September 2022	20 May 2023	&&&&&&&&&&&&&029.&&&&&029	&&&&&&&&&&&&&&09.&&&&&09	&&&&&&&&&&&&&&06.&&&&&06	&&&&&&&&&&&&&014.&&&&&014	&&&&&&&&&&&&&031.&3000031.03
İstanbulspor		16 October 2023	present	&&&&&&&&&&&&&013.&&&&&013	&&&&&&&&&&&&&&02.&&&&&02	&&&&&&&&&&&&&&02.&&&&&02	&&&&&&&&&&&&&&09.&&&&&09	&&&&&&&&&&&&&015.38000015.38
Total				&&&&&&&&&&&&&045.&&&&&045	&&&&&&&&&&&&&013.&&&&&013	&&&&&&&&&&&&&&09.&&&&&09	&&&&&&&&&&&&&023.&&&&&023	&&&&&&&&&&&&&028.89000028.89

Honours

Club

Grasshoppers

• Swiss Super League: 2000–01

Basel

• Swiss Super League: 2001–02
• Swiss Cup: 2001–02, 2002–03
• Uhrencup: 2003

Galatasaray

• Turkish Cup: 2004–05

Young Boys

• Uhrencup: 2007

Individual

• Axpo Swiss Super League Player of the Year: 2003, 2008
• Swiss Super League top scorer: 2007–08 (24 goals)

See also

In Spanish: Hakan Yakın para niños