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Turkeys Galatasaray said Saturday it would rename its stadium after Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogans call for the removal of the word arena from sports stadia, state media reported.

The board of directors took the decision to change the stadiums name after the president made the call on this issue, club chairman Dursun Ozbek said, quoted by state-run news agency Anadolu.

The Turkish football teams venue will be called Turk Telekom Stadium instead of Turk Telekom Arena from Monday, according to Hurriyet daily.

Erdogan said Friday he was against the use of the word arena and had given instructions for their removal from stadia to Sports Minister Akif Cagatay Kilic.

Of course you know what they used to do in arenas in the past? They would let people be shred to pieces.

He claimed it was a term foreign to Turkish: What does arena mean? We dont have such a thing in our language.

Several stadia in Turkey have the word arena in their title including Istanbul team Fenerbahces basketball venue, home of last weekends EuroLeague champions, called the Ulker Sports Arena.

Meanwhile Istanbul team Besiktas opened its over 40,000 capacity waterfront Vodafone Arena stadium in April last year.

Turk Telekom chief executive Paul Doany welcomed Galatasarays move, saying he supported Erdogans call for the arena names changes.

We are in agreement with Galatasarays name change from Turk Telekom Arena to Turk Telekom Stadium. We have begun work, Doany said.

The sports ministry issued a warning to provincial governors to remove the word arena from stadia across Turkey, Anadolu reported.

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Galatasaray to rename stadium after Erdogan call - Vanguard