Rıdvan Yılmaz (born 21 May 2001) is a Turkish professional

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby lea ...

who plays as a

left-back In the sport of association football, a defender is an Glossary of association football terms#O, outfield player whose primary role is to stop attacks during the game and prevent the opposition from scoring. Defenders fall into four main categ ...

for club

Rangers A ranger is typically someone in a law enforcement or military/paramilitary role specializing in patrolling a given territory, called "ranging" or "scouting". The term most often refers to: * Park ranger or forest ranger, a person charged with prot ...

and the Turkey national team. Yılmaz is a graduate of the

Beşiktaş Beşiktaş () is a district and municipality of Istanbul Province, Turkey. Its area is 18 km2 and its population is 175,190 (2022). It is located on the European shore of the Bosphorus strait. It is bordered on the north by Sarıyer and ...

youth academy. He made 62 first-team appearances for Beşiktaş, helping them win the domestic league and cup double in the 2020–21 season. In July 2022, he joined Rangers for an initial transfer fee of £3.4 million. Yılmaz made 50 appearances for Turkey's youth national teams, from under-16 to under-21 level. He made his senior international debut in May 2021, and was a member of Turkey's squad at

UEFA Euro 2020 The 2020 UEFA European Football Championship, commonly referred to as UEFA Euro 2020 or simply Euro 2020, was the 16th UEFA European Championship, the Anniversary#Latin-derived numerical names, quadrennial international men's association footb ...

Club career

Beşiktaş

Yılmaz was born in

Gaziosmanpaşa Gaziosmanpaşa (; old name: ''Taşlıtarla'') is a developing working class municipality ( belediye) and district of Istanbul, Turkey, on its European side. Its area is 12 km2, and its population is 495,998 (2022). Esenler and Bayrampaşa a ...

, Istanbul. He spent 10 years of his youth career in the academy of

, which he joined at the age of seven. Yılmaz made his professional debut with Beşiktaş as a late substitute in a 7–2

Süper Lig The Süper Lig (, ''Super League''), also known as Trendyol Süper Lig for sponsorship reasons, is a professional association football league in Turkey and the highest level of the Turkish football league system. In the 2023–2024 season, twen ...

win over

Çaykur Rizespor Çaykur Rizespor Kulübü is a Turkish professional Association football, football club based in Rize, a city on the eastern Black Sea region, Black Sea coast. The team competes in the Süper Lig, the top tier of Football in Turkey, Turkish footba ...

on 8 April 2019. In the 2020–21 season, he won the Süper Lig and

Turkish Cup The Turkish Cup () is a football cup competition in Turkish football, run by the Turkish Football Federation since 1962. During a brief sponsorship period with Fortis, its sponsored name was ''Fortis Türkiye Kupası''. Now Ziraat Bankası is ...

with Beşiktaş.

Rangers

On 25 July 2022, Yılmaz joined Scottish club

on a five-year deal for an initial transfer fee of £3.4 million, with the deal containing add-ons that could raise the fee to £5.3 million. He made his debut for the club as a substitute against Belgian team

Union Saint-Gilloise Royale Union Saint-Gilloise (), also known as Union Saint-Gilloise, Union SG or simply Union, is a Belgian professional football club from Brussels based in Forest. Founded in 1897 in the neighbouring Saint-Gilles, the club has played its home ...

, during a

UEFA Champions League The UEFA Champions League (UCL) is an annual club association football competition organised by the UEFA, Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) that is contested by List of top-division football clubs in UEFA countries, top-divisio ...

qualifier loss on 2 August. Yılmaz suffered a serious hamstring injury in a

Scottish Premiership The Scottish Premiership, also known as the William Hill (bookmaker), William Hill Premiership for sponsorship reasons, is a professional association football league in Scotland and the highest level of the Scottish football league system. Th ...

match against

Aberdeen Aberdeen ( ; ; ) is a port city in North East Scotland, and is the List of towns and cities in Scotland by population, third most populous Cities of Scotland, Scottish city. Historically, Aberdeen was within the historic county of Aberdeensh ...

in October. After more than four months, he returned to the Rangers first-team as a substitute in a

Scottish Cup The Scottish Football Association Challenge Cup,Raith Rovers Raith Rovers Football Club is a Scottish professional football club based in the town of Kirkcaldy, Fife. The club was founded in 1883 and currently competes in the as a member of the Scottish Professional Football League. The club has won f ...

in March 2023.

International career

Yılmaz played youth international football for Turkey at under-16, under-17, under-18, under-19 and under-21 levels, making 50 appearances in total. In May 2021, Yılmaz was called up to the senior

Turkey national football team The Turkey national football team (), recognized as Türkiye by FIFA and UEFA, represents Turkey in men's international Association football, football matches. The team is controlled by the Turkish Football Federation (), the governing body for ...

's preliminary 30-man squad for

. He made his senior international debut on 27 May 2021, in a warm-up friendly against Azerbaijan. He was included in Turkey's final 26-man squad for Euro 2020.

Career statistics

Club

International

Honours

Beşiktaş *

2020–21 The dash is a punctuation mark consisting of a long horizontal line. It is similar in appearance to the hyphen but is longer and sometimes higher from the baseline. The most common versions are the endash , generally longer than the hyphen ...

Turkish Super Cup The Turkish Super Cup, known as Turkcell Super Cup () for sponsorship reasons, is a super cup tournament in Turkish football. Founded in 1966 as a two-team competition, the current version has been contested since 2025 by four teams: the winners ...

2021 Like the year 2020, 2021 was also heavily defined by the COVID-19 pandemic, due to the emergence of multiple Variants of SARS-CoV-2, COVID-19 variants. The major global rollout of COVID-19 vaccines, which began at the end of 2020, continued ...

Rangers *

Scottish League Cup The Scottish League Cup, also known as the Premier Sports Cup for sponsorship reasons, is a football competition open to all Scottish Professional Football League (SPFL) clubs. First held in 1946–47, it is the oldest national League cup in ...

: 2023–24

References

External links

Profile
at the Rangers F.C. website * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Yilmaz, Ridvan 2001 births Living people People from Gaziosmanpaşa Sportspeople from Istanbul Province Turkish men's footballers Turkey men's youth international footballers Turkey men's under-21 international footballers Turkey men's international footballers Beşiktaş J.K. footballers Rangers F.C. players Süper Lig players Scottish Professional Football League players Men's association football fullbacks UEFA Euro 2020 players Turkish expatriate sportspeople in Scotland Turkish expatriate men's footballers Expatriate men's footballers in Scotland 21st-century Turkish sportsmen