The spatial history of football in Istanbul: Football in the city from Mesire to hali saha (1880-2019)

This study evaluates the spatial development and transformation of football in Istanbul on the basis of competitiveness of national level and international success of Turkish football. For this purpose, a series of comprehensive evaluations have been made regarding the location of football fields in the city by creating a historical and current inventory of the regular football fields of Istanbul through printed and digital sources as well as witnesses and interviews. Football, which was institutionalized in England with its original and pioneering historical experience, was first played in Istanbul in the meadows of promenades, which are public spaces where everyone participates at a certain time. Afterwards, it has undergone a second stage of development, in which urban areas, schools, fields of military training and urban squares are allocated to football. After the half of the 20th century, football has been diversified and developed by using the unqualified areas within the new neighborhoods created by rural to urban migration, and also has penetrated deep into the daily life of the Istanbul. The quality of a small part of these pitches has increased over time, the grounds of some fields where football is played extensively are covered with grass and these spaces have become defined football grounds. However, towards the end of the 20th century, urban space started to differentiate in Istanbul. Increasing population, the occupation of the streets and other areas by cars, the streets became uncanny over time, the intensive construction activities and urban transformation practices in Istanbul started to exclude football practice from the population-dense areas of the city. Football in Istanbul, which started in the promenade as a public space, has now become a small number of halı saha that are only for football, surrounded and closed from the outer, and also many of which are paid. Football schools emerging in these fields and they have started to fill an important gap as a result of the new childhood practices and the exclusion of football from the city. As a result, while the quality of the existing fields and football knowledge increased in Istanbul, the number of football fields compared to the population and the access to football practice decreased. As of 2019, there were 59 active football fields in Istanbul districts within the sample, while 248 regular football fields were closed to play football between 1880 and 2019. The new situation in the city directly affects the competitiveness of Istanbul and Turkish football. Keywords: Istanbul, football, daily life, social change, modernization, urbanization, spatial transformation, migration, urban renewal.