This was the first and hopefully the last match that I did not get to watch live, so I had to settle for the next best thing: following on Twitter. I do have to say this is an excellent way of following the matches. It is in Finnish so it may not be an option for all my readers, but those who know enough Finnish should follow it when they cannot make it to the match. You do not need to have a Twitter account to do it, just follow the link above for the TamU-K Twitter feed.

After the long four-week break, the season finally restarts on Friday with a match against TaPa 2. We have a bit of a feeling of unfinished business with TaPa 2 since in the first round of the season we ended up tying them 2-2 in a match that we really should have won. This alone would guarantee a highly motivated team on the field, but we also know that chasing Pelikassit and Vire in the promotion race requires us to not drop any points at all.

The Kutonen season is now at the half-way point, and it is time to analyze the past and make some predictions for the second half of the season. TamU-K has now played one match against each opponent, and in the second half we’ll play them again in the same order, naturally with the home and away designations reversed.

Rarely have my match predictions been as accurate as for this one. In the match preview I wrote that we’d be in good shape if we organized our defense well. And that we did despite the crucial absences. And as I wrote it came down to our finishing. We had good opportunities for 4-5 goals, but did not score, in part due to excellent goal keeping, which I also noted in my preview. Then when we were down by a couple goals and some of the players started to lose their faith in our ability to come back, Vire’s strong midfield made life very difficult for us. All of this were the ingredients for a bitter 1-3 loss against Ikurin Vire.

TamU-K has the last match of the spring season on Tuesday, and it is shaping out to be a big one. The opponent is Ikurin Vire, who are just two points behind us in the standings right now. With a win TamU-K goes to the break second in the table, five points ahead of major competitors behind us. At the same time Pelikassit would be just five points ahead of us (assuming they win TaPa 2 on Saturday), and we’d be within striking distance in case they start dropping points. With a loss, however, we drop to third one point behind Ikurin Vire and also the gap to Pelikassit starts to look too large.

Well that was one roller coaster of a match against Ylöjärven Ryhti. We ended up winning 4-5, but after being 0-3 up at the half and scoring 0-4 early in the second half, it simply should not be this difficult. But again, it was all our own doing.

TamU-K just played on Sunday, but the next match is coming almost too soon. On Tuesday evening we are away at Ylöjärvi playing against the second team (YlöR/2) of the local club Ryhti. Founded in 1931, this is a traditional club that has activities in multiple sports ranging from Nordic skiing to volleyball. Their first football team plays two divisions above us in Nelonen.

Today’s match against AC Darra was just as difficult as I predicted. They looked a much better team than what their position at the bottom of the table would seem to indicate. Still, for the most part we can only blame ourselves for making it difficult. The defense had all sorts of problems whole match long, no doubt largely caused by the fact that our leading center back Ahmed Lakra was not able to play in this match. In the midfield and offense old problems resurfaced in that we seemed to be unable to make things connect for large stretches of the match. Still, the team must be commended for fighting hard and playing with a lot of heart, and we undoubtedly deserved the 4-3 victory.

On Sunday we have again crucial points on the line in a match against AC Darra. I have a feeling this match could be similar to last weekend’s match against FC Tribe. Both Darra and Tribe are based on a group of friends and have been playing in the lower divisions for a number of years. Even though Darra have lost all of their five matches this year, most of them were against the top teams in our subdivision, and they lost three of them by just one goal. Even the overall goal differential of 7-17 is not horrible for a team that has lost all of their five matches in Kutonen.

It was a great day at Pyynikki Stadium until the 68th minute. The 115 people in attendance were treated to a hard fought match that had a bit of a derby feeling to it. Sinikaarti was singing loud, and the wooden roof projected the sound straight onto the field. At the half a line formed to the sausage stand. Many people also picked up a TamU-K scarf.