İttihatspor or founded as Union Club in 1908 was a Turkish

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), goal. Unqualified, football (word), the word ''football'' generally means the form of football t ...

club founded by Turkish footballer

Ziya Songülen Nurizade Ziya Songülen (9 September 1886 – 21 August 1936) was a great-grandson of Damat Gürcü Halil Rifat Pasha and his second wife Saliha Sultan, an Ottoman princess. His parents were Azize Hanim and Hariciyeci Suad Bey. He was the founde ...

who founded, and later left the major Turkish

multi-sport club A sports club or sporting club, sometimes an athletics club or sports society or sports association, is a group of people formed for the purpose of playing sports. Sports clubs range from organisations whose members play together, unpaid, and ...

Fenerbahçe, former mayor of

Istanbul Istanbul is the List of largest cities and towns in Turkey, largest city in Turkey, constituting the country's economic, cultural, and historical heart. With Demographics of Istanbul, a population over , it is home to 18% of the Demographics ...

Cemil Topuzlu, former Minister of Foreign Affairs in the

Ottoman Empire The Ottoman Empire (), also called the Turkish Empire, was an empire, imperial realm that controlled much of Southeast Europe, West Asia, and North Africa from the 14th to early 20th centuries; it also controlled parts of southeastern Centr ...

Mehmed Rıfat Pasha, British businessman James William Whittall and English sportsperson James LaFontaine. Union Club was refounded in 1920 with the name İttihatspor by Aydınoğlu Raşit Bey, the same year it became champions of the Istanbul Sunday League. The Union Club, legally did not have the identity of a sports club. It was considered a commercial and private enterprise. With the initiatives of the Minister of Finance of the period,

Şükrü Saraçoğlu Şükrü ( Turkish from ) is a Turkish given name. Notable people with the name include: * Şükrü Halûk Akalın (born 1956), retired Turkish academic and bureaucrat * Şükrü Altın (born 1956), Turkish historian, novelist, educator and painter ...

, a decision of the Council of Ministers in 1929 introduced the practice that if there were more than one sports club operating in the same neighbourhood, only the one with the highest number of members would continue its activities and the others would be closed down, and in this context, the activities of İttihatspor, which was located in the same neighbourhood as Fenerbahçe, were terminated. The grounds of İttihatspor were first transferred to the National Real Estate Administration and then leased to Fenerbahçe.

Union Club Field

Papazın Çayırı (later known as Union Club Field and İttihatspor Field) was a former football pitch in the

Kadıköy Kadıköy () is a municipality and Districts of Turkey, district on the Asian side of Istanbul Province, Istanbul Province, Turkey. Its area is 25 km2, and its population is 467,919 (2023). It is a large and populous area in the Asian si ...

district of

. Today, Fenerbahçe Şükrü Saracoğlu Stadium is located in the area where the field is located. It is claimed that the pitch was rented to Fenerbahçe Club for one year in 1909.

Honours

* Istanbul Sunday League : Winners: 1920–21

References

{{Reflist Football clubs in Istanbul Association football clubs established in 1908 1908 establishments in the Ottoman Empire