Kennedy Bakircioglü

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Personal information
Kennedy Bakircioglü
Date of birth	November 2, 1980 (1980-11-02) (age 27)
Place of birth	Södertälje, Sweden
Height	1.81 m (5 ft 11+¹⁄₂ in)
Playing position	Midfielder
Club information
Current club	AFC Ajax
Number	7
Senior clubs¹
Years	Club	App (Gls)*
1996-1998 1999-2003 2003-2005 2005-2007 2007-	Assyriska Föreningen Hammarby IF Iraklis FC Twente AFC Ajax	034 0(10) 127 0(38) 024 00(4) 066 0(23) 019 00(3)
National team²
1999-2001 2001-	Sweden U21 Sweden	014 00(1) 014 00(0)
¹ Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only and correct as of 12:00, 19 August 2007 (UTC). ² National team caps and goals correct as of 12:00, 22 August 2007 (UTC). * Appearances (Goals)

Kennedy Bakircioglu (born November 2, 1980 in Södertälje, Sweden) is a Swedish football player of Assyrian origin.^[1]^[2] He currently plays for Ajax in the Dutch Eredivisie. He has also played for the Sweden national football team.

1 Biography
2 Statistics
3 See also
4 References
5 External links

[edit] Biography

Bakircioglu's family arrived in Sweden in 1972 from Mardin,Turkey. His father, Bünyamin (Benjamin) Bakircioglu, was one of the first to play for the new club Assyriska Föreningen, a club established by the Assyrian diaspora. Kennedy started off his professional career with Assyriska in 1996 and stayed at the club until 1999. In 1998-99, Bakircioglu had a trial with Manchester United, but did not do enough to secure a contract with the English club. In the summer of 1999, he joined Hammarby IF, and remained there for the next five years, during which time he led the team to its first championship in 2001. In his time at Hammarby, Bakircioglu was well known to many players of the computer game Championship Manager. Bakircioglu had the reputation of a legend in the game.^[3] In 2005, he was elected Hammarby's fourth greatest player of all time in an online poll held on the club's website.

In 2003, Bakircioglu moved abroad to play in Greece for Iraklis. As he had played the 2003 season in Sweden, he joined his new team half-way through their season and only managed seven league appearances. In his second and last season at the club, he was unable to hold down a first team place and was soon on the move again. He joined the Dutch team FC Twente prior to the start of the 2005-06 season and impressed his manager Fred Rutten straight away to become a first team regular. In fact, in his two seasons at the club he only missed two league appearances and managed to score 23 goals. His efforts didn't go unnoticed and on 5 May 2007, Dutch newspaper De Telegraaf announced that Bakircioglu would be playing for Ajax in the 2007-08 season.^[4] He was officially signed by Ajax ten days later on 15 May 2007. At Ajax, he immediately secured his second career trophy when they beat PSV Eindhoven 1-0 in the Johan Cruijff-schaal. In his first Eredivisie match for Ajax, he scored one goal in the 8-1 drubbing of De Graafschap.

[edit] Statistics

Season	Club	Competition	Apps	Goals
1996	Assyriska Föreningen	Division 2	1	0
1997	Assyriska Föreningen	Division 2	8	1
1998	Assyriska Föreningen	Division 1 Norra	25	9
1999	Hammarby IF	Allsvenskan	25	2
2000	Hammarby IF	Allsvenskan	26	5
2001	Hammarby IF	Allsvenskan	26	8
2002	Hammarby IF	Allsvenskan	25	11
2003	Hammarby IF	Allsvenskan	25	12
2003/04	Iraklis	Super League Greece	7	2
2004/05	Iraklis	Super League Greece	17	2
2005/06	FC Twente	Eredivisie	32	9
2006/07	FC Twente	Eredivisie	33	15
2007/08	Ajax	Eredivisie	19	3
Total			252	76