Fatih Sonkaya

Fatih Sonkaya — Biography

Fatih Sonkaya (born 1 July 1981 in Oltu, Erzurum) is a Turkish retired footballer who played as a right-back. Having moved to the Netherlands with his family, where he also holds Dutch nationality, he started out in football there and, after several youth clubs, joined the academy of Roda JC. He began his professional career on loan at VVV-Venlo, then became a regular at Roda from 2000, playing through the club's run to the round of 16 of the UEFA Cup in 2001-02. He transferred to Beşiktaş at the start of the 2004-05 season, but was not favoured by the coaching staff and made only one Turkish Cup appearance in the second half of that season.

Sonkaya moved to Portuguese club Porto for 2005-06 and featured sparingly as the club won the league and cup. He was loaned to Académica and then back to his former club Roda JC, where he played in the Dutch Cup final that Roda lost. After his Porto contract was terminated in 2008, he joined Azerbaijan's Khazar Lankaran and moved on to Kayseri Erciyesspor midway through that season. He had a brief spell at Northern Cyprus's Çetinkaya in 2011-12 before finishing his career back at Khazar Lankaran, retiring in 2016.

Capped 19 times in total for Turkey, Sonkaya made his senior debut against the Czech Republic on 30 April 2003 and played at the 2003 FIFA Confederations Cup, where Turkey finished third. Since retiring he has worked as a football pundit in Turkey, and in 2026 he made headlines by joining the Dutch army.