This past weekend was filled with events: TamU-K Support Night at Klubi on Friday, the first team’s home opener against Urjalan Palloseura (UrPS) at Pyynikki Stadium on Saturday, and the second team’s season opener at Kaukajärvi on Sunday. Quite frankly I was a little nervous coming into all this. Would the Support Night be a success? Would the first team get the three points that we needed in order to have a positive start to the season? Would we be able to pull off our choreo in Sinikaarti’s section successfully? Would the second team show that they can play competitively in Kutonen? The answers were, yes and yes and yes and yes. We’re here, and we’re bigger than we ever were.

The event at Klubi was a screaming success. I hear that we broke even early on in the night, but that was not as important as the fact that we had a lot of people in there having a great time. The bands were all great, and by the time Asa was performing well after midnight, it was close to a full house. For the supporters Vala’s show was the most important one, and they absolutely kicked ass. When they played their signature song Tämä kaupunki on meidän (”This City is Ours”), the supporters started a mosh pit in front of the stage. Good times! From what I heard the starting act Polartones as well as Nyrkkitappelu who followed Vala were on fire as well, but unfortunately I missed most of these two shows due to volunteering at ticket sales and other tasks.

The next morning was a bit rough for many supporters, but starting at about 2 pm people started to drizzle to Sinikaarti’s chosen prematch venue at Pyynikintori. I had to actually leave early on as I helped setting things up at the stadium, but I did not really mind. This club means so much to me that I was happy to make that sacrifice for everybody’s benefit. As we were about to finish setting up, Sinikaarti was leaving the bar. It was obvious to everybody in the stadium. At a 300 yard distance from the bar, it sounded as if they were chanting right in the stadium.

The rest is Finnish football history. The away supporters arrived about ten minutes before the match and found their own bleacher style stand that the stewards had cleared for them on the opposite side from the main stand. They soon started chanting, and I was impressed with them. It seemed they had just under twenty people singing, but it was heard loud and clear in the main stand. Even when Sinikaarti was singing, you could tell

that there was another chant going on on the other side of the field. This made Sinikaarti sing even louder, and I think the response from UrPSupporters must have been the same.

It was of course clear who were the bigger and louder group, but credit to UrPSupporters for forcing the best out of us. It was a good decision by the club to put them opposite to Sinikaarti rather than in the other end of the main stand – it is so much better when you can actually see the other group. The result was an atmosphere that was better than in most top flight (Veikkausliiga) matches in Finland. I doubt anything like this had ever before taken place in the lower leagues in Finland. In some ways our promotion match at the end of our first competitive season in Kutonen was better. However, even then we did not have the same kind of support for the away team.

On the field the battle was much less even than in the stands. UrPS had a decent start but failed to create any real chances, and TamU-K took control of the match. The 1-0 goal at the 15th minute came from an easy cross that the goalie dropped onto Jacin Dakkaki’s feet: an easy goal for him. Just four minutes later the 2-0 goal was a beautiful shot by Eero Riponiemi from about 25-30 yards out. It hit the top corner, but I feel like many keepers on this level would have been able to get to it.

With no more goals in the first half, everybody on the main stand side moved to half time happy with what they had seen. All the arrangements at the stadium felt bigger than they ever did before. The club had invested to a few new banners that were used at the two sales points as well as on top of the home team bench. There were a couple club flags flying in the western end of the stadium, and even the corner flags had been replaced with ones that had a blue and green pattern. Pyynikki Stadium has always felt like a home for us, now that feeling was deeper than ever. With all home matches but one played there this season, it is a reality on paper as well – finally.

Even the half-time offering was more delicious than before. Unfortunately Restaurant 4 Vuodenaikaa were not able to cater their hot dogs for this match, but they still played a role in pleasing our taste buds with their cold sausage rolls. In addition, the barbecue was on fire and plenty of hot sausages were eaten as well. And by the way, I hear that the French style hot dogs are going to be back in our next home match.

The second half resulted in four more goals for us and an eventual 6-0 (2-0) victory. I had expected us to get the three points, but a blowout victory was beyond any reasonable expectation. Jan Riikonen was again on fire and scored a couple goals, but for me the man of the match was Jan Irjala. His 4-0 goal from a free kick given by Risto Niskanen was just icing on the cake, but the real deal was his dominant presence at the back. Together with Timo Kauppinen the two center backs did not give UrPS any chances. The two full backs Ville Toiva and Jonne Keränen had excellent matches as well.

Our final 6-0 goal was scored on the 90th minute by the fan favorite Mika Kytöviita. He only played 14 minutes at the end, subbing in for Niko Saarinen who probably had his best match in our blue shirt yet. I was glad to see Mika open his account. He has had a bit of a rough start to the season, missing a few practice sessions and not really getting into rhythm, so a confidence-boosting goal is always a nice thing to happen. Also, this goal moved us to the top of the Nelonen table, ahead of FC Melody, by having a better goal differential.

As most of you probably know, the match was streamed live at tamu-k.com/live. A lot of my friends in Seattle sent messages to me about watching the match, and I think we got a pretty good audience here in Finland as well. You can still watch the match replay at the same address. Some of those goals are real beauties, so you probably should do that right now if you can. The atmosphere and all the chanting comes through pretty loudly as well.

Things are definitely much bigger this season than they ever were for us. Perhaps the biggest indication of that is the fact that we have more competitive teams than just one. The second team started their season on Sunday, and ended up playing a 1-1 (0-1) tie against Roxbury JK. They were down 0-1 at the half, so coming back to at least get one point was good. Still, I had similar feelings at this match as I did after the first team’s home opener against FC Melody: we had chances to score the winning goal in the second half, and probably should have. Still, it was a very promising performance from a team that had only played two training matches together before their season opener. Vala’s lead singer Joona Valkeala scored our goal, and played an altogether nice match. The band’s guitarist Mikko Malinen played a pretty solid match in central defence.

Always Tampere – Forever United is the slogan we have on our website this season, and that is what Sinikaarti’s choreo said too. I do think that sentiment is shared by almost all of the nearly 200 people that attended our home opener in Pyynikki.

TamU-K – UrPS 6-0 (2-0)
15 min 1-0 Jacin Dakkaki
19 min 2-0 Eero Riponiemi
56 min 3-0 Jan Riikonen
73 min 4-0 Jan Irjala
86 min 5-0 Jan Riikonen
90 min 6-0 Mika Kytöviita

Discipline:
–

Attendance:
178