After a long summer of transfer speculation, midfielder Atiba Hutchinson finally got on the field for Besiktas of Turkey.
With the club’s European future still up in the air due to a pending ruling from the Court of Arbitration for Sport over a match fixing scandal by his club prior to his arrival, Hutchinson made his debut on Thursday in the Europa Leauge as Besiktas dropped a 2-1 game to Tromso of Norway in the first leg of their playoff.
Even if Besikas comes back to win the tie, they could still be thrown out if the CAS rejects their appeal. That decision is expected before the end of the month.
It was a better Super League start for Hutchinson as Besiktas are perfect through their first two games of the season. Hutchinson wasn’t involved in the season opener but he was on Monday as Besiktas beat Kayseri Erciyesspor 4-2.
It was also a good week for Milan Borjan as he backstopped Sivasspor to their first win of the Super Lig season. Sivasspor now has a win and a loss after their 2-0 win over Konyaspor on Sunday.
In Sweden, it wasn’t a good week for Kenny Stamatopoulos’ AIK as they were knocked out of the Swedish Cup and lost in the league. Stamatopoulos was in goal on Thursday as AIK was upset by lower league Sandviken 3-2 in extra time and followed that up with a narrow 1-0 loss to Halmstad on Sunday. AIK slipped to third in the Allsvenskan with the loss.
Down in the Superettan, it’s now three games without a win for Nik Ledgerwood and Hammarby as they lost 3-0 to Falkenberg on Monday. Ledgerwood played the full 90 minutes as Hammarby are in eighth place.
In the German Bundesliga, forward Simeon Jackson remains goalless and Eintracht Braunschweig remains winless through three games. Jackson played the whole game on Sunday as they lost 2-0 to Eintracht Frankfurt.
Down in the 2. Bundesliga, all the Canadians who saw action came off the bench. Forward Rob Friend came on in the 75th minute for 1860 Munich as they lost 1-0 to Paderborn on Sunday. The loss was Munich’s first in three games this season.
Elsewhere, Andre Hainault and Olivier Occean went head to head for Aalen and Kaiserslautern, respectively. In the end, it wasn’t close as Aalen easily won 4-0 on Saturday as Occean came on in the 67th minute and Hainault in the 85th.
In England, defender David Edgar was a 78th minute substitute on Saturday for Burnley in their 2-0 loss to Brighton and Hove Albion. Edgar then got the start and played the full 90 minutes on Tuesday as Burnley knocked off League One side Preston North End 2-0. Preston forward Iain Hume started and went 73 minutes.
In Cyprus, Daniel Haber made a brief debut for Apollon Limassol as he came off the bench in second half injury time as they beat France’s Nice 2-0 in their Europa Cup playoff first leg on Thursday.
In Greece, midfielder Julian de Guzman played all 90 minutes as Skoda Xanthi beat Panthrakikos 1-0 on Sunday for their first win of the season.
In Uruguay, Lucas Cavallini made his debut for Nacional as a 67th minute substitute on Saturday for Nacional as they picked up a late goal for a 1-0 win over Rentistas to remain perfect through two games in the Primera Division Apertura season.
