Fastest goal in the FIFA World Cup: South Korea versus Turkey. Hakan Sukur scores for Turkey inside 15 seconds. I just don’t think anyone is going to break this record for quite a while. Hakan Sukur slots the ball home after the South Korean defender gives the ball away when he’s under pressure…take a look.
Sukur remains the career leading scorer for Turkey’s national team, with 51 goals. His most famous came when he scored 11 seconds into the third-place match of the 2002 World Cup, leading Turkey over South Korea, the host country. That is the one he usually hears about.
“I scored a lot of goals,” Sukur said with a smile. “Not just a fast goal.”
There were hundreds of them, ranging from the Champions League and UEFA Cup to Turkey’s top-tier Super Lig, where Sukur spent most of his career. He came up first for Bursaspor, then spent many years and more than 300 matches with the Istanbul powerhouse Galatasaray, which Sukur led to eight league titles and to a surprise victory in the 2000 UEFA Cup. A stirring run there culminated in a penalty shootout victory against Arsenal.
He also played for Torino in Italy’s Serie A, and later for Inter Milan. He played against Premier League competition with England’s Blackburn Rovers. He retired from Galatasaray in 2008 as famous as anyone in Turkey, known as Kral (King) and the Bull of the Bosphorus, for the strait that cleaves Turkey in two, symbolically separating Europe and Asia.
