J. Sertkaya

The move that took Yusuf Sertkaya from Bursaspor to BB Bodrumspor in June 2024 did not go through the transfer market in the usual way. Bodrum FK paid Bursaspor a training fee — yetiştirme bedeli — of $200,000 for the years the club had put into him, and handed the midfielder a five-year contract as they prepared for their first season in the Süper Lig.

Those years had been long ones. Sertkaya joined the Bursaspor academy in 2017, and waited until the 2023–24 season for his first senior football in the TFF 1. Lig. He then played 27 matches in that campaign, without a goal or an assist to his name — a holding midfielder at 188 cm, right-footed.

He returned to Bodrum in June 2025.

His international record is fuller than his club one. Sertkaya won nine caps and scored once for Turkey's under-19 side, and was in the squad for the 2024 UEFA European Under-19 Championship, where Turkey went out in the last 16 to Norway. He has since added seven caps and a goal at under-20 level, including matches in the U20 Elite League tied to qualification for the 2025 FIFA U-20 World Cup.

He wears number 20 at Bodrum, and comes from the Yıldırım district of Bursa — the city whose club raised him and then sold his development on.