A name that will fill the heart of the Irish football fan with rage has popped up in the news today, after it emerged that Turkey's all-time leading international goalscorer Hakan Sukur is facing up to four years in jail due to his activity on twitter.
He may not even be the most infuriating Hakan to have caused Irish fans distress over the years, but Sukur and his Turkish side from the Euro 2000 qualification playoff with always have a spark a scowl from anyone who watched them in Landsdowne Road, or listened to their antics in Bursa.
Well it turns out that Sukur, who became involved in politics after his retirement from football, made a number of insulting tweets directed at the current president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and his son, and after prosecutors rejected the former Inter Milan and Galatasaray striker's claims that the tweets were not directed at the president, he is now facing up to four years in prison according to The Guardian.
Prosecutors have charged Şükür with posting tweets from his account @HakanSukur containing “insulting content against Mr President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and his son,” the private Dogan news agency reported.
In his defence, Şükür, 44, said he did not intend to target the president in his posts, the content of which was not made clear. But that was rejected by prosecutors, who claimed that the tweets were “clearly related” to Erdoğan, the news agency said.
If convicted, Şükür faces up to four years in jail, according to the charges. As the indictment has been approved, a first hearing is expected in the coming weeks.
Sukur was elected as an MP to president Erdogan in 2011 but resigned in 2013 after a probe into corruption in the president's inner circle, so Sukur airing his dirty laundry on twitter was never going to go down well.
We'll bring you more on this as it develops, and in case you were wondering, the Hakan that Irish fans will no doubt hate more than any other is this guy:
Hakan Yakin, you undoubtedly talented, highly irritating so and so.
