Just as a reminder, the views expressed in this blog are those of the author, and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Tampere Unitedin kannattajat (TamU-K).

Today we finally got the news that hardly came as a surprise: the club is getting fined for the pyro and pitch invasion at the ViiPV – TamU-K match that sealed our promotion. The shocker is the amount: 600 euros is a lot of money for a club that played in the sixth tier this season.

The rules are pretty clear and the fine is certainly given in accordance with them. I’m also not going to argue the rationality of the rules here, because that is a discussion for another time and another place. However, the amount of the fine seems excessive in comparison to the level of the league. Many clubs on this level operate on budgets of a lot less than 10,000 euros, and even for TamU-K the 600 euro fine represents several per cent of the yearly budget.

In fact, the fine is not much lower than clubs in the top division get for similar offenses. If we scaled our fine with those budgets, the equivalent fines would be on the order of 50,000 – 200,000 euros. Can you imagine the outcry if that happened? Yet, here we are reading comments that we got what we deserved. Outrageous.

To be clear, I’m not calling for fines to be directly proportional to budgets, but I would expect some sort of moderation in lower leagues. A fine that is more than one per cent of the operational budget seems extreme. The

100 euros we got last season for two separate pyro incidents seemed appropriate for the level, but now the powers that be seem to operate on a completely new set of guidelines. Based on what is happening in the Uusimaa district of the FA, this is a national phenomenon. I dare not even think how bad it will get before it gets better.