Bilge Tarhan

Bilge Tarhan — Biography

Bilge Tarhan was born on 12 February 1941 in Adana. He spent his entire professional career, from 1959 to 1973, with İstanbulspor and became one of the club's most celebrated figures. With 227 top-flight appearances he ranks third in the club's history, and his 58 league goals make him the club's second-highest scorer behind his longtime strike partner Koço Kasapoğlu; together with Kasapoğlu and İhsan Baydar he formed one of Turkish football's most successful attacking trios for over a decade.

Alongside his football career, Tarhan also completed a civil engineering degree at Istanbul Technical University, a combination that drew repeated attention from the sports press of the time. He represented Turkey at the men's football tournament of the 1960 Rome Summer Olympics. He died in Istanbul on 9 October 2016.