Nordic Football News

FC Honka – KuPS 4-1
TPS – RoPS 3-2
Haka – FC Lahti 3-0
FF Jaro – IFK Mariehamn 0-0
VPS – JJK 3-2

This round-up comes a bit late, sorry for that. The reason is that I was on target with all my predictions and have spent my day signing autographs, posing with ugly football fans and talking to betting companies, who are competing for my signature and offering me cars, yachts, virgins and big houses.

Anyway, Honka returned to Espoo from their unsuccesful and unpopular temporary move to Finnair Stadium. 4102 people who thought a 20-minute trip to a Honka game in Helsinki is just too much trouble (they might have a point, as it was reported that a considerable percentage of the spectators came with their bicycles) saw Honka take a comfortable 4-1 win against KuPS. Demba Savage, Rasmus Schüller and Hermanni Vuorinen scored for Honka before Ilja Venäläinen gave KuPS some consolation. Jaakko Lepola then finished the job on 53 minutes. Five goals aside, the game must have been pretty dull, because a brown hare that crossed the pitch near the end of the first half spent its Thursday in the media limelight.

TPS need to take some lessons in team building. They have enough midfielders to make up a competitive midfield for two or three teams, but if only one defender is injured, they don’t have anyone to replace the poor kid. Centre-back Jaakko Nyberg suffered of an ankle injury, and couldn’t play against RoPS. Too scared to give the youth team’s centre-back Kalle Mäkinen or full back Jani Aaltonen a chance, Pasi Rautiainen decided full back Sami Rähmönen should play centre-back, while midfielder Chris Cleaver tried to take care of Rähmönen’s usual job as right back. It wasn’t exactly a major success, because Christopher Musonda put him in considerable trouble, scoring a goal and hitting the crossbar. RoPS had the better chances, but TPS took a 3-2 win, thanks to goals from Mikko Paatelainen, Riku riski and Christian Andreasen.

I have no idea why, but Lahti are really struggling. They have the players, and having seen them once this year, they seem to play well enough. Haka still won them 3-0 at home, the goals being scored by Niko Ikävalko, Mika Mäkitalo and Mikko Innanen. Jaro managed a draw hosting IFK Mariehamn, who, according to Jaro coach Mika Laurikainen, were the best team Jaro have played so far.

VPS took a seemingly tight but reportedly comfortable 3-2 over JJK. They now have no less than five straight wins. Before Petri Vuorinen and Juha Reini took over, the team had yet to win a game in this year’s Veikkausliiga. Who said changing the boss never helps?