The draw for the fourth round of Finnish Regions’ Cup was made yesterday, and it could not have been much better for TamU-K. Once again we got a home match, and the opponent Lohikosken Pallokerho (LPK) plays just one division higher than we do. It wont be an easy match, but we could have done much worse in the draw.

LPK is based in the city of Jyväskylä and play in Nelonen (fifth tier) in the Central Finland district. It is difficult to say how the fifth tier there compares to different divisions in the Tampere district, but the assumption has to be that the match will be as tough as the LeKi match was last weekend. This still gives us an excellent opportunity to advance to the next round and be among the last 16. It will be far from easy, but it will be much easier than a match against a top team one tier higher would have been. There were many of those that we could have drawn instead.

The match will be our first competitive match against a team from outside of the Tampere district. That as such is a milestone. As a supporter I was hoping for a nice away trip in the 100-200 km range, but competitively speaking playing home is definitely an advantage here. And if we win, in three week’s time we’ll have another draw to get excited about.

The match has to be played by June 15th, so an announcement of the exact date should be expected this week. However, things are probably a little bit up in the air right now due to the low availability of fields in Tampere. Grass fields are starting to open up, so that might ease up the situation a little bit. Still the problem remains that we already have league matches on weekends, and most fields are fully booked on weekdays. Hopefully we’ll know in the next few days where and when this match will be played.