Baykal Kulaksızoğlu (born 12 May 1983) is a

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby lea ...

who currently plays for

FC Schaffhausen FC Schaffhausen is a Swiss Association football, football team from the town of Schaffhausen. The club set to plays in the Promotion League from 2025–26, the third tier of Swiss football after relegation from Challenge League (Switzerland), Ch ...

. Born in Turkey, he was a youth international for Switzerland.

Career

Early years

Baykal started his children's football by local club FC Bethlehem and after a few years moved on to the youth department of

SC Bümpliz 78 SC Bümpliz 78 is a football team A football team is a group of players selected to play together in the various team sports known as football. Such teams could be selected to play in a match against an opposing team, to represent a football ...

. In summer 2000 he moved to the youth department of Grasshopper Club and joined their U-21 team. One year later he advanced to their first team, where he stayed for two seasons. At the end of the

2002–03 Nationalliga A The 2002–03 season of the Swiss Nationalliga contained two divisions, each with twelve clubs. The top tier was called Nationalliga A (NLA) (, ) and the second tier was named Nationalliga B (NLB). Overview The season was divided into two phases ...

season GC won the championship and Baykal had seven appearances that season under head coach

Marcel Koller Marcel Martin Koller (born 11 November 1960) is a Swiss professional football manager and former player who was most recently the head coach of Al Ahly in the Egyptian Premier League. Playing career Born in Zürich, Koller played his entire car ...

. Baykal then moved to

Thun Thun () is a List of towns in Switzerland, town and a Municipalities of Switzerland, municipality in the administrative district of Thun (administrative district), Thun in the Cantons of Switzerland, canton of Canton of Bern, Bern in Switzerland. ...

in summer 2003, under head coach

Hanspeter Latour Hanspeter Latour (born 4 June 1947) is a Swiss football manager and former goalkeeper In many team sports that involve scoring goal (sport), goals, the goalkeeper (sometimes termed goaltender, netminder, GK, goalie, or keeper) is a designa ...

he made regular appearances in their first team. They finished the

2003–04 Swiss Super League The 2003–04 Swiss Super League was the 107th season of top-division football in Switzerland. The competition was officially named the ''AXPO Super League'' due to sponsoring purposes. It began on 16 July 2003 and has ended on 23 May 2004. This ...

season in sixth position and one year later, under new head coach

Urs Schönenberger Urs Schönenberger (born 21 February 1959) is a Swiss 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 ( ...

, as runners-up.

Basel

Baykal joined

FC Basel Fussball Club Basel 1893, widely known as FC Basel, FCB, or just Basel, is a Swiss professional Association football, football club based in Basel, in the Basel-Stadt, Canton of Basel-Stadt. Formed in 1893, the club has been List of Swiss footba ...

's first team for their 2005–06 season under head coach

Christian Gross Christian Jürgen Gross (born 14 August 1954) is a Swiss football manager and former player. He played as a sweeper and central midfielder. Gross was manager of Basel from 1999 to 2009, winning four Swiss Super Leagues and four Swiss Cups. As ...

, who had started his seventh season with the club in that position. Basel had just won the championship for the second time in a row and Gross had to replace a number of midfielders who had left the club. After playing in six test games Baykal played his domestic league debut for the club in the home game in the

St. Jakob-Park St. Jakob-Park () is a Swiss sports stadium in Basel. It is the largest football venue in Switzerland and home to FC Basel. "Joggeli", as the venue is nicknamed by the locals, was originally built with a capacity of 33,433 seats. The capacity w ...

on 16 July 2005 as Basel won 1–0 against

Schaffhausen Schaffhausen (; ; ; ; ), historically known in English as Shaffhouse, is a list of towns in Switzerland, town with historic roots, a municipalities of Switzerland, municipality in northern Switzerland, and the capital of the canton of Schaffh ...

. To the beginning of the season he played in the starting eleven, but soon found himself on the bench and in the second half of the season he was only used five times as joker. Basel started the season well and led the championship right until the last day of the league campaign. On the final day of the league season Basel played at home against

Zürich Zurich (; ) is the list of cities in Switzerland, largest city in Switzerland and the capital of the canton of Zurich. It is in north-central Switzerland, at the northwestern tip of Lake Zurich. , the municipality had 448,664 inhabitants. The ...

. A last-minute goal from Zürich's

Iulian Filipescu Iulian Sebastian Filipescu (born 29 March 1974) is a Romanian former professional footballer who played as a centre back. Club career Filipescu was born in Slatina, Olt County. He debuted in Divizia A with Steaua București in 1992, where he ...

meant the final score was 1-2 in favour of the away team and it gave FCZ their first national championship since 1980–81. The title for Basel was lost on goal difference. At the end of the season the club let Baykal move on for a moderate fee. During his time with the club, Baykal played a total of 39 games for Basel without scoring a goal. 15 of these games were in the

Swiss Super League The Super League (also known as the Credit Suisse Super League for sponsorship reasons) is a professional association football league in Switzerland and the highest level of the Swiss football league system. It has been played in its current fo ...

, two in the

Swiss Cup The Swiss Cup (; ; ; ) is a football cup competition that has been organised annually since 1925–26 season by the Swiss Football Association. The Swiss Cup final is usually the most important game of the year with a high attendance. The co ...

, nine in the

UEFA Cup The asterisk ( ), from Late Latin , from Ancient Greek , , "little star", is a Typography, typographical symbol. It is so called because it resembles a conventional image of a star (heraldry), heraldic star. Computer scientists and Mathematici ...

and 13 were friendly games.

Later career

In June 2006, he signed with 2nd Bundesliga club

1. FC Köln 1. Fußball-Club Köln 01/07 e. V., better known as simply 1. FC Köln () or FC Cologne in English language, English, is a German professional association football, football club based in Cologne in North Rhine-Westphalia. It was formed in 1948 ...

. He left Cologne in January 2008 and joined Young Boys on a free transfer. He stayed with them until June 2009 and transferred to

FC Aarau FC Aarau is a Swiss professional football club based in Aarau. Founded in 1902, the club competes in the Swiss Challenge League, the second tier of Swiss football after being relegated from the Swiss Super League. History FC Aarau was form ...

for one year. In summer 2010 Baykal signed a two-year contract, dated to the end of June 2012, with Karşıyaka Spor Kulübü in Turkey. However, he left the club in May 2011 and joined PFC Lokomotiv Sofia. He was released in early January 2012. Baykal returned to Switzerland and joined semi-professional club

, who at that time played in the 1. Liga, the fourth tier of Swiss football. Schaffhausen won the division and were promoted to the

1. Liga Promotion The Promotion League, named the Hoval Promotion League for sponsorship reasons, is the third tier of the Swiss football league system. Eighteen clubs compete in the league, playing each other twice over course of the season. The champions are prom ...

and the following season they were division winners here too. Baykal played one season for

FC Tuggen FC Tuggen is a Switzerland, Swiss football club from the town of Tuggen in Canton Schwyz, the Linguistic geography of Switzerland, German-speaking region of Switzerland. The club was founded in 1966 and currently plays in 1. Liga Classic, the fou ...

, two seasons for FC Linth 04 and one season for FC Muri, before retiring from active football. Baykal played in Switzerland's U21-National squad and featured in

2004 UEFA European Under-21 Football Championship The 2004 UEFA European Under-21 Championship was the 14th staging of UEFA's European Under-21 Championship. The final tournament was hosted by Germany between 27 May and 8 June 2004. Italy won the competition for the fifth time. Italy's Alberto G ...

References

Sources

* Die ersten 125 Jahre. Publisher: Josef Zindel im Friedrich Reinhardt Verlag, Basel.
Verein "Basler Fussballarchiv" Homepage

External links

Official Website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kulaksizoglu, Baykal Living people 1983 births Swiss men's footballers Turkish men's footballers Turkish emigrants to Switzerland Naturalised citizens of Switzerland Switzerland men's under-21 international footballers Swiss Super League players 2. Bundesliga players TFF 1. Lig players First Professional Football League (Bulgaria) players Grasshopper Club Zurich players FC Thun players FC Basel players FC Schaffhausen players 1. FC Köln players BSC Young Boys players Karşıyaka S.K. footballers FC Lokomotiv 1929 Sofia players FC Tuggen players Swiss expatriate men's footballers Expatriate men's footballers in Germany Swiss expatriate sportspeople in Germany Turkish expatriate sportspeople in Germany Expatriate men's footballers in Bulgaria Swiss expatriate sportspeople in Bulgaria Turkish expatriate sportspeople in Bulgaria Men's association football midfielders Footballers from Istanbul 21st-century Swiss sportsmen 21st-century Turkish sportsmen