Ismail Kartal has resigned as Fenerbahce head coach a day after Monday's 2-1 Istanbul derby defeat by Galatasaray, the club confirmed on Tuesday — his second resignation in 47 days, and this time the board have accepted it.
Fenerbahce announced that Kartal had conveyed his decision to leave to the club's administration and that the two sides had parted by mutual agreement. "Mr. Ismail Kartal, who carried out the duty of head coach for our Professional Football A Team, has conveyed his decision to leave his post to our administration and we have parted ways after mutual agreement with him," the club said in a statement reported by Reuters. No successor was named.
A derby defeat that ended a fourth spell
Monday's derby defeat did the damage. Victor Osimhen struck twice in the first half at Rams Park and, although Irfan Can Kahveci pulled one back after the break, Fenerbahce could not find an equaliser — Milan Skriniar's late header was cleared off the line. It was a third league defeat of the season for Fenerbahce, who sit fifth in the Super Lig on 16 points, six behind leaders and champions Galatasaray.
The defeat also ended in a brawl on the pitch, with Archie Brown and Abdulkerim Bardakci sent off after the final whistle. On Tuesday Fenerbahce condemned what they called attacks on their players and called for an investigation and disciplinary action, while Galatasaray accused their rivals of making misleading allegations in response, as Reuters reported. By the end of the day, the argument had cost Fenerbahce their head coach as well as the derby.
The resignation the president refused in September
Kartal, 65, was in his fourth spell in charge, having returned in June 2026 after the club dismissed Domenico Tedesco following a season that ended with Galatasaray taking the title by three points. Extraordinarily, he had already resigned once this season: after the 1-1 Champions League draw with Roma in September he announced he was stepping down, only for president Aziz Yildirim to refuse the resignation and persuade him to stay, according to Flashscore.
This time there was no way back. A squad rebuilt at a cost of more than 100 million euros in the summer — Mason Greenwood, Romelu Lukaku, Vedat Muriqi and Nathan Ake among the arrivals — was assembled to end a 13-year wait for a league title. Instead Fenerbahce are six points adrift after nine games and have just two points from three Champions League matches, drawing with Roma and Slavia Prague before a 6-0 defeat at Aston Villa.
So what happens now?
Fenerbahce must now find a new head coach with the season already at a crossroads. The title race is not lost — six points can be recovered — but a third league defeat before November leaves almost no margin for a bedding-in period. In Europe, Liverpool visit Istanbul on 4 November in the Champions League, a fixture that now looks like a baptism of fire for whoever takes the job, permanent or interim.
The new coach also inherits the fallout from the derby brawl, with any disciplinary rulings still to come, and a dressing room built expensively and quickly around Kartal's return. Getting Greenwood and Lukaku firing consistently, and closing the gap on a Galatasaray side unbeaten at home in 40 league matches, is a brief few managers would envy.
Beyond the Final Whistle: Kartal's second resignation tells the real story of Fenerbahce's season. When a president talks a coach out of quitting in September and accepts the same letter in October, the problem was never really the dugout — it is a 100-million-euro project that has delivered derby defeats, European humiliation and chaos within four months. The next appointment cannot be another familiar face offered as a sticking plaster; Fenerbahce need a coach the board will back when the first crisis comes, because on this evidence it will come quickly.
Was Kartal right to walk away after the derby, or should Fenerbahce have stood by him? Let us know in the comments.
