The league’s sparkling decision on Thursday is part of a much bigger whole than who will rise and who will fall in the spring of 2025, writes hockey journalist Sami Hoffrén.
Timing was undeniably special. There was only a brisk hour left for the Joker’s historic press conference, when Liiga put big trees in the oven in Vallila’s warm Office and organized a mediator’s meeting.
On Thursday at 12:46, the league announced: “The investigation into the future of the series will move to the second phase – the league’s license conditions will be updated”.
In Finnish: The league locked the door to its penthouse – at least for now.
The core message of the release was that the League will be put on hold for at least a year and a league license cannot be applied for the 2024–25 season. A new team can enter the league for the 2025–26 season at the earliest.
This is how we go for at least the next two seasons.
The announcement was received in very different moods in the two clubs that are seeking promotion in the next few years. The Kilbanjujo takes place in the capital region between Jokerie and Kiekko-Espoo.
in Kiekko-Espoo had less unexpectedly worse feelings when the announcement came out.
Chairman of Kiekko-Espoo Amy Rubinstein said in the announcement that the club’s goal is to play in the League in the fall of 2024.
The frustration is understandable, because Espoo has been building a new rise to the limelight with a more long-term approach in the past three years. The club moved up from the Suomi series to Mesti at the end of spring 2020. A year ago, Kiekko-Espoo already played in the finals. This spring there was already a real boom in Espoo, when Kiekko-Espoo roared to the championship.
Thursday’s league decision was like a wet rag in the face for the Espola club.
Mesti’s reigning champion Kiekko-Espoo has purposefully built its route to the League.
League President Heikki Hiltunen had time to immediately deny in the league’s press release that the solution of the league shareholders is “in no way” a statement of support for the project that got Kiekko-Espoo’s tough rounds at the end of the season.
“On the contrary, this should be seen as a decision where the same rules apply to everyone. Also the league’s current clubs, which every year have to claim their place in the league by meeting the license requirements,” comments Hiltunen.
“
For the Jokers, the League’s solution was excellent news.
For Jokers The league’s decision was excellent news. Hats were thrown in the air in the joke camp, even though the door to the League was closed to the Jokers at the headline level.
The situation now is that the Jokerit can build their organization in peace, both on the sporting and financial side, for the next two years. The pressure to rise is not acute. If a league license could have been applied for the 2024–25 season, the Jokers would have been in a hurry without helping.
Even now, it’s enough to poke around in the new rough joker deck, because after leaving the KHL, Jokerit 3.0 starts from scratch.
At this point, the Jokers only have the brand value to meet the league’s demands. Nothing else. The whole heaven has to be rebuilt. In Thursday’s first press conference, Joker’s leading figures spoke a lot of true things and the visions sounded perfectly reasonable.
Jokerit aims to become the top team of Mestis right away next season with a player budget of around 300,000 euros. League promotion is the goal in the next few years. Jokerit wants to be the most valuable sports brand in Finland for its partners and the best club in Finland in terms of responsible player production.
Hard guidelines and goals.
Jokeri’s board chairman Mikko Saarni (left), CEO Antti-Jussi Niemi, sports director Olli-Pekka Yrjänheikki and head coach Tero Määttä appeared at a media conference on Wednesday.
Espoo direction, the League’s decision to deny license applications for the next two years might be seen as a harsh favoritism for the Jokers, but I don’t believe in this scenario.
Although the Liiga’s press release on Thursday was full of hard-to-interpret corporate language, Hiltusen’s comments also revealed why the Liiga did what it did.
“In the first phase of the strategy work, we especially took into account how big our responsibility is for the league’s long-term development. We have thought about things extensively and openly, but we only want to make carefully thought-out solutions. That’s why the work is still going on. Any haste would be a mistake,” Hiltunen announced.
The background of the shocking solution is that the Liiga will take an extra time when defining the license conditions. Casting mistakes have been made in the definition of license conditions in recent years, which must be fixed before major series model changes.
It is clear that big changes are ahead.
the league the discussion about the opening has been more heated during the past year than it has been in a long time.
The league has been a closed series for a long time – although Hiltunen has tried to verbalize this differently. The most recent league qualifiers were played in the spring of 2013. Since the 2013–2014 season, the league qualifiers have been replaced by a license system where the winner of Mestis has been able to apply for a major league license.
It often comes to mind that the League’s decision made now is part of a much bigger whole than who will rise and who will fall in the spring of 2025.
Now it’s all about the future of Finnish club hockey. The willingness to change to renew the series system is high, based on the speeches of the athletes.
This spring, the Players’ Association conducted a survey for all Liiga and Mestis players. The players were asked if there should be a chance to rise and fall between Liiga and Mestis based on athletic success. 98 percent of the players were in favor of open series.
The qualifying model seen in previous years, where the bottom of the League qualifies against the winner of Mesti, will hardly come true.
It is also difficult to see a situation where two teams, Jokerit and Kiekko-Espoo, would be promoted to the League through the cabinets. It would swell the League’s 17 teams into a golden piggy bank. Does not happen.
Mikko Saarni is the Joker’s biggest boss.
More likely the scenario is the so-called A- and B-league model, which was introduced to the public years ago, i.e. all League teams and Mestis’ top teams are connected to two different level leagues under the same satellite. The number of teams could be 10+10 or 12+10.
During the past year, behind the scenes of the League, various series models have been reviewed and a possible series system reform has been scaled. The pressure to change is strong.
A shocking change to the A and B series model would be very welcome in the coming years, because now the pressure in the direction of the league comes from two upstarts in the capital region, Jokeri and Kiekko-Espoo.
Although at the moment in Espoo you can complain that the league closed the door, it is only a matter of time when both Jokerit and Kiekko-Espoo will be seen again in the League. The series is just likely to be very different from what the duo left at the time.
#Comment #shocking #scene #emerges #background #leagues #scandalous #decision
