Marked for Severi Kähkönen
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad11 Sep 2028
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 16 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Market11 Sep 2028
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Ventspils, and it is not being withdrawn.
Market11 Sep 2028
Only the photograph left for Raivis Rugins
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Raivis Rugins will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Ventspils the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad11 Sep 2028
Arturs Cauna in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Ventspils this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad11 Sep 2028
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Eduards Jurkovskis and Ventspils agree another 3 years.
Squad11 Sep 2028
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Eduards Jurkovskis, and the manager let it.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match17 Jun 2028
KuPS leave it late against FF Jaro
Ninety minutes of very little, and then everything at once. The winner arrived in the 85th, and FF Jaro spent what remained of the match appealing to the referee rather than chasing the ball.
Squad19 Jun 2028
Arttu Heinonen: that is not what I was promised
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” KuPS have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Player ratings19 Jun 2028
Jaime Moreno, 33, rolls back the years — 8.23
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.23 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Squad19 Jun 2028
Tempers go at KuPS
Lassi Lappalainen was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Squad19 Jun 2028
Words at KuPS training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Saikou Touray is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Match17 Jun 2028
FF Jaro made KuPS work for it, but the scoreboard read 2‑1 at the end and the table does not ask how.
Player ratings19 Jun 2028
Ninety minutes of Gustav Engvall at his very best
Marked 8.39. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at KuPS.
Squad19 Jun 2028
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Avtandil Daraselia, and the manager let it.
Market19 Jun 2028
The Jaime Moreno story refuses to die
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Jaime Moreno signs something — a contract at KuPS or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad1 May 2028
A fracture rules Vladimir Bubanja out for 38 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason KuPS will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Market1 May 2028
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what KuPS can pretend not to have heard.
Market1 May 2028
Arttu Lötjönen has one foot out of the door
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around KuPS they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad1 May 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at KuPS this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad1 May 2028
Saikou Touray falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Squad1 May 2028
Jaime Moreno gets it from the manager
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Match29 Apr 2028
KuPS come up short against RoPS
RoPS left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Market1 May 2028
“They were honest with me, and I would rather know.” Arttu Heinonen has been informed he is not in the manager's thinking at KuPS.
Player ratings1 May 2028
The chances came and went for Jaime Moreno
10 shots, and a count that reads like a good afternoon until you check the other column. Strikers survive weeks like this on the understanding that the chances keep arriving; the day they stop is the day it becomes a problem.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad11 Oct 2027
Tempers go at KuPS
Petteri Pennanen was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Squad11 Oct 2027
Saikou Touray falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Squad11 Oct 2027
The medical room confirms 35 days on the sidelines for Severi Kähkönen, and a plan built around him now has to be rebuilt.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad3 May 2027
“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.
Squad3 May 2027
Noah Markmann falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Market3 May 2027
Kasim Adams told to find a new club
“They were honest with me, and I would rather know.” Kasim Adams has been informed he is not in the manager's thinking at KuPS.
Squad3 May 2027
The manager makes an example of Saikou Touray
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Match1 May 2027
HJK take the points off KuPS
Beaten 0‑1, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Squad3 May 2027
A place in the month's best eleven for Jaime Moreno
Four or five weekends of consistency, judged against everybody in the division doing his job. Jaime Moreno has come out of that comparison in the side, and KuPS have had the benefit of every one of those afternoons.
The terraces3 May 2027
Everybody has an opinion about Jaime Moreno
He is the name in every column and on every phone-in, which is a heavy thing to carry at any age. Some footballers thrive on it; others are quietly finished by it.
Player ratings3 May 2027
5.54 on the card. Some afternoons a footballer looks like a man who has only just been introduced to the game, and this was one of them.
Player ratings3 May 2027
Marked 5.64. Nothing he attempted worked and by the hour mark he had stopped attempting much, which is the part a manager notices rather than the mistakes.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad18 Jan 2027
Omar Reyes in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at KuPS this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad18 Jan 2027
Words at KuPS training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Saikou Touray is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Squad18 Jan 2027
24 days, the medical staff say, and medical staff are optimists by profession. The team sheet will look wrong without him.