A Viking's Tale

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24/09/2021

'The importance of bringing through young players form your academy can not be undervalued. They embody everything that your club stands for and, in the darkest of hours, produce the brightest of lights. They were born learning about the history of the club, live in the present as fans of the club and will go on to create and establish the future of the club. They are everything' - Kalle Koskinen.

An exciting day for FC Viikingit as the latest set of youth players competed for a place in the club's under-20s. At the ages of 15 and 16 years old, a set of players battled it out to impress the U20s manager, Tuomo Kivimäki, the Head of Youth Development, Jukka Mustonen, and the senior team manager, Kalle Koskinen. The three were vastly impressed by the talent on display by the minors and were confident of a bright future for the football club with the group of players coming through.


Of the players in the Youth Intake who impressed, Pasi Jäntti arguably impressed the most. The six foot tall 15 year old midfielder was a player who possessed incredible technical ability an eye to create chances for himself and his team mates. Likened to Ivorian footballing legend Yaya Touré, big things are expected of Jäntti who could become a key player for Viikingit in the coming years.


Central defender Artturi Nava was also among those who shone. The 16 year old was a very good tackler and a well-rounded athlete. Despite his young age, his good decision making was apparent and he may be in contention to play some part of the senior domestic season next year for FC Viikingit if he continues to impress.


A third player to impress was young shot stopper Teemu Paavilainen. A brilliant reflex keeper, Paavilainen also showed good leadership skills, despite his tender age of 16. Competition for the senior keepers, perhaps?

Following a rather disappointing end to the regular league season, FC Viikingit were placed into the Relegation Group with five of the other bottom half teams in Ykkönen. They knew that two wins from five would probably be enough to avoid relegation but the target was to win every game.

FC Viikingit's new look attack looked threatening. Joona Järvistö and Max Ehrnrooth, in particular, were in fine goal scoring form. They helped Viikingit to four straight wins to secure the club's safety in Ykkönen for another year. A defeat on the final day of the season for the club was not enough to dampen bouyant spirits as the team began to become optimistic about their chances of performing even better next season.

Despite a loss in their final game, Viikingit's four game winning streak helped them to stay six points clear from relgeation. Their goal scoring return was as good as any of the promotion contenders in the league but it was their defending which let them down massively. While the minimum expectation for Viikingit for next season will be to stay up, they will be hoping for a place in the Promotion Group next term.

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It has been a season of ups and downs for Kalle Koskinen and FC Viikingit but, overall, it should be seen as a year of great success on most fronts for the club. At the start of the season, the objective was to survive in Ykkönen and avoid relegation, and that was achieved with relatively flying colours. Let's break down the year in football.

On the face of things - a very solid season for FC Viikingit. The club was expected to be relegated by every media outlet in the country but managed to comfortably survive. Despite being involved in the Relegation Group, the results in the group demonstrated that Viikingit were perhaps too good to be involved in a relegation battle. However, the season showed a lot of work was needed in training and the transfer market to chop the gap between Viikingit and the clubs above.

The league season has to be considered a successful one. Despite a poor run of form, safety was achieved and big steps were made. There was a lot of exciting, attacking football on the way and, if not for some defensive frailties, the club was on the brink of a promotion push at one stage.

The magic of the Suomen Cup! FC Viikingit marched on, impressively, to the Semi Finals of the competition. Wins over SJK and HJK along the way were particularly impressive. Ultimately, FC Honka Espoo were too strong in the semi finals and defeated Koskinen's men. Honka went on to win the competition, but it was FC Viikingit who were deemed as the real overachievers.

With regards to the goalkeepers, the big sticking point is that there were only 5 clean sheets in the league this season (all by Craig Hill). A sign of a better goalkeeper being required, as well as a need to improve a defence that had no standout stars at all.

The midfield was okay, but a little lacklustre, while the attacking midfield and the strikers held the team together. Haukur Baldvinsson, in particular, impressed after joining mid-season and fans will be hoping he continues his impressive form into next season.

In terms of finances, there was a loss this season. The club lost a lot of money through the Youth Setup and will be hoping some of the youngsters brought into the U20s will turn out to be good assets for the club in the future. With wages set to rise next season, Viikingit will be hoping to improve match day income to cut the gap between money out and money in.

Attendance figures did not make for great reading, considering the size of the stadium Viikingit play at. For a stadium with a capacity of 4,300, an average attendance of 355 absolutely sucks. Hopefully with a year of exciting football under Koskinen under the belt, attendances improve next season, because the club needs the money.

After a promising first season, FC Viikingit will be looking to make a statement in Ykkönen this season. Koskinen's side avoided relegation last term quite comfortably and will be looking to secure, at minimum, a mid-table finish in the league this season, with an eye out for finishing in the top half and securing passage to the Promotion Group of the competition later on in the year.

FC Viikingit will, once again, wear Adidas kits embroidered with the Elisa logo. A red home kit with a white trim will be partnered with a dark blue away kit with white diagonal pinstripes running through it. Hopefully these kits will bring great fortune to the team this year.


FC Viikingit's season will kick off in mid-January with a couple of friendlies before starting the Suomen Cup campaign. They will play against five other Ykkönen sides in a Group Stage where the top two will earn qualification to the knockout stage. Among the opponents will be FC Honka Espoo, who knocked Viikingit out at the Semi Final stage last season and were only just relegated from the Veikkausliga, in what will be an exciting encounter.

Ykkönen football will recommence in April against FC Honka Espoo, with Viikingit looking to produce a better campaign than last season. It will be tough, with more quality in the league than last season, but Viikingit will be hoping that a year with Koskinen in charge will have given them enough experience and development to push further forward.

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After a very promising first season under Kalle Koskinen, FC Viikingit fans were excited about their team's prospects in the Suomen Cup group stage beginning in January. Having reached the semi final stage last season, excitement was in the air. The club knew that a strong showing in the group stage of the competition would be a good warmup for the upcoming Ykkönen league season. With an important year of football beginning for FC Viikingit, it was time for the Helsinki-based club to prove their worth.

Note the first image includes transfers from 2021 - two players joined in November and December for this season - while the second image contains signings made in 2022 for this season. In total, eight signings were made to bolster Viikingit's squad in all areas of the pitch.

In terms of defensive recruitments, Ville Seppä came in to start as the new first-choice goalkeeper. Christian Enemark, Frans Grönlund and Teemu Honkaniemi came in to replace the outgoing central defenders. They were a significant upgrade on outgoing players, with Christian Enemark perhaps capable of playing in the top tier if he wanted to. Tuure Mäntynen came in to provide quality competition at left back.

Benjamin Thurling came in to start in central midfield for Viikingit. Thurling had played for the club previously and will settle back in easily. Noah Mannerström Egvik and Toni Neuvonen came in to improve the attack. Mannerström Egvik will provide competition in the central attacking midfield position, while Neuvonen will compete for a starting spot up front.

Two friendlies were played before Viikingit kicked off their Suomen Cup campaign against FF Jaro. A rather unconvincing win earned three points, which was followed up by a draw against KTP. Viikingit bounced back with a win over IFK Vasa before a late loss against FC Honka Espoo. Going into the final group game, Viikingit required a win to progress to the knockout rounds. Viikingit turned up at their best to trounce MP Mikkeli.

FC Viikingit will kick off their Ykkönen league season against familiar opposition in the form of FC Honka Espoo. The first two-and-a-half months of league football will prove to be intense, with a lot of games to be played. Suomen Cup action will return at the end of April, as Viikingit will host Veikkausliga side KuPS.

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16/04/2022

The first game of a league season always brought a few nerves to Kalle Koskinen. Despite playing for Bayern Munich for the majority of his senior career, and then working as an assistant manager at both Bayern Munich and Manchester City, Kalle always felt every ounce of emotion possible in the twenty-four hours prior to the opening fixture. It came from a building anticipation, pressure from the fans, and the eyes of the world. The emotions would all disappear once the first whistle was blown by the referee but the buildup was often comparable to a major final, no matter what club you were involved in.

Every team in the world aims for the 'perfect' start to a league campaign, and Viikingit were no different. Another impressive group stage in the Suomen Cup, coupled with some fantastic first-team acquisitions, left supporters with a lot of hope ahead of the upcoming Ykkönen season. They topped the Relegation Group last term, quite comfortably, and the expectation was to get into the Promotion Group this time out. The players that had come into the club during the off-season were too good to aim for anything less.

It meant Viikingit would need to finish in the top six in the regular portion of the league season - after the opening 22 games, where the league is then split into two groups - something which the club had not achieved since 2012. It wasn't completely out of the question, based on some of the form the club demonstrated last season, and chairman Mikael Forsman was speaking of his confidence over a few rounds of alcohol at a local pub on the eve of the club's first league game of the season.

"If we can hit the ground running," said Mikael, "I don't see any reason why we cannot come out of the regular stage of Ykkönen with a top-half position."

His six companions each nodded in agreement, albeit one doing so nervously. The nervous gesture came from Kalle Koskinen himself. He had seen enough from his players in the year so far to know they could finish in the top half but he knew, from past experiences, that expectations can often differ vastly from reality.

Mikael and Kalle were joined by five others - four men and one woman - all ranging in age from twenty-eight to thirty-five. They came from various countries around the world, all united by their passion for football and their ambitions to take FC Viikingit as far as possible. Their names were Amie Belshaw, Harry Owens, Jack Bamford, James Viduka and Luke Hendricks. They were students at the University of Helsinki who worked part-time for FC Viikingit during their final year of studies of their various degrees and offered invaluable contributions behind the scenes for the club.

Amie Belshaw, the only female of the group, was a twenty-eight year old from Newcastle, England. Born into a football-mad family, she played at youth level herself but chose to pursue studies in the world of finance. She was incredible with numbers and, behind a light-brown bob, green eyes and a gentle smile, she was crunching figures in her head and calculating potential income and expenditure for the club based on various performances. For Viikingit, she was in charge of the ledger. She logged money coming in and money going out and was also tasked with being the leading figure of the group. She had an eye for detail and was a very methodical person.

Harry Owens, of Limerick, Ireland, was a former youth player himself. The oldest of the group at thirty-five years old, Owens worked for his father at a logistics company in the west of Ireland for a number of years. He decided to go to Helsinki to partake in Masters studies and was responsible for facilities and logistics management for FC Viikingit. He made sure the home stadium was in order prior to each game, training facilities were up to standard and transport to and from games was organised, as well other tasks. He was a well-built man who took pride in his aesthetic appearance, often flexing his biceps whenever women walked passed him.

Jack Bamford of Leeds was the jester of the group. At twenty-nine years of age, Jack was the only former senior footballer of the five. He once played for Leeds United in League One but was booted out of the club for snorting cocaine off a stripper's vagina on a Snapchat video. He has since gone clean and developed a love for making projections and predictions for sports. He went to Helsinki to study financial analytics and worked at Viikingit as a sort of planner. He spent a lot of time watching the kids' teams play - something he enjoyed doing a lot, picturing what Viikingit's minors could provide in the future.

James Viduka was the oddball of the bunch. From Perth, Australia, James had a talent for saying the utterly ridiculous. It made him a popular character on social media, with his comments usually being shared globally. He was Viikingit's manager of marketing and public relations. He spent his days in touch with local media platforms, looking to improve the club's popularity, and providing a medium of communication between the club and its supporters. His running of the club's Twitter account during matchdays has been a particular highlight - except the one time he accidentally Tweeted out a dirty text he had intended to send to Jack.

The last of the five was Luke Hendricks. He was a fun-loving events manager from Johannesburg, South Africa. His love of events came from a young age, when he organised an orgy in his shed at the of seventeen. His parents weren't too pleased with this, particularly as he had invited his own cousins. For FC Viikingit, he was in charge of ticket sales for home and away games, including season ticket sales, match day events including food and coffee kiosks, fliers and entertainment, as well organising forums for FC Viikingit and their official fan group, Viikingit Fan TV. The importance of his role could not be understated, with the club setting clear objectives to raise attendance levels significantly over the coming years.

"How many season tickets did we sell this season?" asked Mikael. He was hoping for a significant increase from the previous season, in order to generate much-needed revenue for the club.

"165 this year, boss," replied Luke. Luke nervously fidgeted with a coaster that was sitting in front of him. "It's up from 163 last season but it is a good way off our target of 180."

"Damn," responded a disappointed Mikael. "That's not ideal but I suppose we have to look at the positives," he continued. "We haven't lost any season ticket holders from last season and it is going in the right direction. If we can have a really good season this time out, hopefully we can get more in next season. What are looking at for ticket sales for tomorrow against Honka?"

"I think we can expect over 800 in attendance for tomorrow, including season ticket sales and away fans," said Luke. "I'd like to aim for a four-figure attendance but the weather is still very cold this time of the year, which will put a lot of people off, and people will still be a bit unsure as to what Viikingit can do this season."

"Amie, does falling short on season ticket sales hinder our financial projections too much?" asked Mikael.

Amie shuffled nervously in her seat. "It doesn't do us any favours," she responded. "We're fine for the next year or so but we either need to cut our wage spend or get more money in if we want to survive at a semi-professional level for an longer than a year."

"I'd go along with that projection," added Jack. "We have enough in the bank to survive the next year at current projects but we'll need to increase our income as much as we can or face having to cut wages. Ticket sales is the obvious route for us to target behind the scenes. It'll then be up to Kalle to improve the club's fortunes on the field, which would then boost our fortunes off the field."

"What do we need to achieve on the field to improve our income?" asked Harry.

"I know our minimum expectation are to finish in the top half but I think we'll need to aim for a good cup run, at least as far as the semi finals, as well as finishing in a position that would get us to a promotion playoff. Obviously promotion is a very long shot for us but the money we'd rake in from a playoff would help significantly."

"The fans we do have are crying out for a similar cup run to what we got last season," added James. "Nobody in the country expected us to reach the semi finals and it was there that we recorded our highest attendance in recent years. The more games we can play in that sees peak crowds coming in, the more notice people will take of our football club. Without trying to sound patronising, Kalle, every win on the pitch helps us grow commercially just as much as it does competitively."

"Well let's hope we can get off to a winning start tomorrow!" said Kalle with smile and a laugh. Behind the laugh was an inner grimace. The club's financial projections meant it was do or die on the pitch this season. Kalle knew he needed major success this time around to keep the club moving in the right direction. No pressure, he thought.

28/06/2022

Ykkönen club FC Viikingit have today been bought out by a local businessman. Long-time owner Mikael Forsman passed on the role of custodian to thirty-five year old entrepreneur Janne Partanen for a fee estimated to be €60,000. The change in ownership marks a pivotal moment in an important season for the football club, as the Helsinki-based team look to establish themselves as a respectable club in Finland.

Forsman's sale of the club marks the end of an era for a man much loved by the club's fans. The football club had spent most of recent seasons in Kakkonen (third tier). Viikingit won promotion back up to Ykkönen (second tier) ahead of last season and earned a 7th place finish in their first season under the management of Kalle Koskinen. The club currently have their sights set on a top half finish in Ykkönen this season.

Born in Helsinki, Partanen became a business owner at the age of nineteen. He started out running pop-up food vendors throughout Helsinki city centre and, after considerable success, became official vendor suppliers for events throughout Helsinki, Lahti, Turku and Tampere, including music festivals, sporting events and other gatherings. In 2013, he added coffee shops and restaurants to his portfolio which is growing with every passing day.

Partanen's move into the football world has not come as too much of a surprise. His love for the game was made well known throughout the years on his social media platforms and he had previously suggested he'd be interested in buying a club at some stage in his life. Viikingit fans will be hoping he shows an ambitious nature while in the position of club custodian.

The change in ownership has also seen a number of additions to the board. To aid with the running of the club, administrative staff Amie Belshaw, Harry Owens, Jack Bamford, James Viduka and Luke Hendricks were all appointed as directors of the club. Partanen will be looking for their expertise to bring about improvements at the club off the pitch. Partanen has set out a number of objectives, off the pitch, for the club to evolve, and his five new appointments will be tasked with the responsibility of improving the club's performance in different sectors.

FC Viikingit were set for a big season in Ykkönen. Following a decent performance last time out in the second tier in Finnish football, the expectation was for FC Viikingit to qualify for the Promotion Group once the regular league season was over. With the club's financial future less than certain, a big season was required to keep things rosy.

Penalties were the bane of FC Viikingit in a desolate month of April. Their two opening league games ended in 1-1 draws, with the opposition scoring late penalties each time. Misery was compounded by KuPS knocking out Kalle Koskinen's side from the Suomen Cup Second Round, courtesy of a penalty of their own.

The Viikingit players might have been excused if their performances dropped off after three difficult results to take but they bounced back superbly in the month of May. Four wins on the trot set them on their way to earning plenty of plaudits from the media, and June was almost equally as impressive, as Viikingit fought for a 8-2-1 record across the two months.

While the goal scoring form from the tail end of last season certainly carried over into the new campaign, it was the defensive exploits of new signing Christian Enemark that stood out. The Danish central defender made somewhat of a Virgil van Dijk impact on the team, winning every single ball that went into Viikingit's half. He was a collosus at the back.

Viikingit's impressive start to the season had them in 2nd place after 13 games played. The club's superior goal scoring was a clear factor to their impressive form and they were in a strong position to end the regular league season in the top half. With 9 games to go in the regular season, things looked promising.

Two major news events for FC Viikingit in June. The first, as you already know, was news of Janne Partanen buying the club from Mikael Forsman. The young, ambitious, local businessman brought an air of excitement with him to the club and has set his sights on lofty heights over the coming years.

The second major news was Kalle Koskinen signing a new contract with the club. His new deal runs to 30/11/2024, and he took a wage cut from €625 p/w to €150 p/w. Koskinen agreed to the wage cut to reduce the club's expenses - with his wage cut saving the club €24,700 per annum.

With nine games to go in the regular league season before the Promotion and Relegation Groups are formed, Viikingit will be looking to secure their place in the top half. Kalle Koskinen will be hoping he can have something to celebrate by the time his side face IFK Vasa at the end of August.

€60,000 for a football club with as much potential as FC Viikingit is an absolute steal, and I've no doubt that the moves made over the off-season and now since the beginning of the season will see a real surge towards success. With the "Famous Five" giving feedback to help the club's growth, that'll help too, but the generosity shown by Kalle to drop his wages so drastically: what a man! Considering the career he's had, it's not like he needs the money anyway

The squad's looking really solid, and I'm quite impressed by Max Ehrnrooth. If he can find a regular goalscoring rhythm, he could be the man to fire you towards promotion. Your early season form has been really pleasing to see, and I'm hopeful that it can continue!

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