Trabzonspor's seventh straight win: is the post-departure midfield actually balanced?

Trabzonspor beat Gaziantep FK 2–0 at Papara Park on Sunday, a fifth consecutive league victory that took Thomas Reis's side to 22 points and third place, three behind Galatasaray. Gaziantep stay 15th on 8. Stefan Savić turned in a Mohamed Salah corner in first-half stoppage time, Ernest Muçi having flicked it on, and Muçi added the second on 61 minutes with a strike from outside the box. He now has three goals and six assists in nine league appearances.

The framing has settled on Salah's delivery, and understandably so: the corner produced the opening goal at the moment the game was tightening. But the more useful question is what the performance says about a squad that has been reshaped. Reports of departures including Christ Inao Oulaï, Salih Malkoçoglu and Felipe Augusto have circulated, and those exits are a plausible explanation for any shift in midfield or defensive balance compared with earlier successful periods. Officials have not confirmed the details, so treat that as a question the coming weeks will answer rather than a settled cause.

Gaziantep created the first clear chances. André Onana blocked Deian Sorescu in the 34th minute and saved Drissa Camara's angled effort two minutes later, and Trabzonspor's own openings — Paul Onuachu heading wide on 39 minutes, Noah Saviolo forcing a save in first-half stoppage time — arrived around the same spell. A 2–0 scoreline can read as control; the shot count says something narrower. Trabzonspor had 18 shots to Gaziantep's 13, and both sides managed six on target. Possession was 57–43. The separation sits in big chances: five for Trabzonspor, none for Gaziantep. That is the number that explains the clean sheet and the margin, and it is also the number that flatters a little, because six shots on target from 13 is not the profile of a side being kept at arm's length.

Expected goals tell a similar story. Trabzonspor's 1.23 against Gaziantep's 0.67 is a comfortable edge but not a dominant one, and it sits well below their own standard this season: an average of 2.46 across earlier 2026/27 matches in all competitions, with open-play expected goals of 0.91 here against an average of 1.92. They scored 0.77 more than their expected goals in this match, against an average of 0.0 across those earlier fixtures. One match is one match, and a finishing overperformance of that size is not a trend — but it does mean the win was built on converting the chances that mattered rather than on generating a volume of them.

That distinction matters because of the fixture list. The seven-match run under Reis includes Samsunspor, KuPS, Beşiktaş, Hearts, Rizespor and now Gaziantep. Beşiktaş and the European ties carry weight, but the sequence has not yet put this side against the top of the table, and the margin to Galatasaray is still three points. Whether the streak reflects a genuinely rebuilt team or a favourable stretch is the open question, and it will not be answered by another home win of this shape.

Muçi is the clearest argument for genuine improvement. A goal and an assist here, six assists in nine league games, and involvement in both goals — the flick for Savić, then the strike from distance. Whether Salah's set-piece delivery is now a structural part of the attacking plan or a one-off is not yet known; one corner is not a pattern, however well taken.

Gaziantep's position invites a similar caution. Fifteenth on 8 points reads as a form problem, yet they had the first two clear chances and matched Trabzonspor for shots on target. They lost because they created nothing of high value — no big chances — and because the home side took theirs. That is a narrow defeat dressed as a routine one.

Reis has seven wins from seven. The balance question remains open, and the next fixtures of real quality will settle it.