During the last several weeks it has seemed almost as if all the other teams in Nelonen are in a collusion to get TamU-K promoted. Week after week we have looked at our rivals in the promotion race drop points in surprising ways, and as a result right now we are standing on the top of the table two points ahead of Ilves 2 and NePa, even though we have one game in hand with respect to the former and two in respect to the latter. Depending on the result of this afternoon’s UrPS – Ilves 2 match, we might be able to build a bit of a cushion this weekend. I dare to say that nobody expected this before the start of the season.

On Sunday we will play against LeKi-futis away at Sääksjärvi, a part of the city of Lempäälä that is just a stone throw away from the Tampere city limits. Facing a team that has lost their last five matches and has not won in their last seven, winning might seem like an easy task. However, I’m pretty sure it will be anything but easy. A closer look at the table reveals that LeKi-futis has only allowed 15 goals in their 9 matches, the third lowest in Nelonen after us and NePa. In fact, no team has scored more than three goals on them, and most of their losses have been by just one goal. It does not seem like scoring on them will be easy – and they do have the home field advantage as well.

Looking beyond the statistics, LeKi-futis is a team of young players who work hard and are willing to run around for the entire 90 minutes. They probably have extra motivation against TamU-K. Not only because of the same reasons that everybody does, but we also do have some history in cup competitions, and at times it got a little heated both on the field and between LeKi players and TamU-K supporters. Add the fact that LeKi-futis do have to start getting some points in order to not get permanently stuck below the relegation threshold on the table, and they will be highly motivated in this match.

TamU-K has always played well in the next match after a loss or a tie. This time our previous match was a win, but we really played like we were going to drop some points, and if it hadn’t been for some last second magic by Risto Niskanen from that free kick, we would have done so. So perhaps it is reasonable to expect the team to have the same kind of bounce-back reaction that they have had many times before. This is not helped by some of the absences though: Petri Vadén, Andrea Milanti, and Eero Riponiemi are all certain to miss this match, and there may be others that were not mentioned in the club’s official match preview. Hopefully Mika Kytöviita will be back as a striker, and continues to link well with Jan Riikonen.

The supporters will travel by public transportation to this match – after all the field in Sääksjärvi is just about the same distance from downtown Tampere as Ikuri where we played our previous away, within the city limits of Tampere. So even if this is technically an away match, for the supporters it does not really feel like one, and the plan is to make that to be the case for the players as well. Kick off is at 6.45 pm on Sunday. Hope to see you there!