4 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
2 boys move up, and somewhere in the building the people who coached them at twelve are quietly having the best morning of their working year. Nothing about this shows up in a result and it is why the academy exists.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Lassi Lappalainen 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Uroš Kabić has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Markku Pukki has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.
Boardroom5 Apr 2027
Deadline passes with 4 signed and 2 gone
That is the business done at HJK until the window opens again. Whether it was enough will be answered on Saturdays rather than in a column, and the first Saturday is close.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Volga is saying, and nobody at HJK is enjoying the guessing.
Lassi Lappalainen and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Brandon López 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.
He is doing things on a Saturday afternoon that nobody around him can answer, which is flattering for about one season and a problem after that. HJK will not keep him by pretending otherwise.
The manager has re-ordered his thinking and Alfie Cicale has come out of it lower. He will be told it is temporary, and the players who have heard that before will avoid his eye.
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Santeri Haarala is on it.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at APOEL is saying, and nobody at HJK is enjoying the guessing.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at HJK this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
Squad29 Mar 2027
Brandon López 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.
Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at HJK. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Alfie Cicale signs something — a contract at HJK or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
14 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. HJK lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
$8.7M was the most the club would pay and Club Brugge were asking for more. Deals like this are revived in the last week of a window roughly half the time, and everybody involved knows it.
HJK asked and Portsmouth said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
The deal with All Boys is done in every sense but the one that puts him on the pitch. Nothing goes wrong at this stage, except on the occasions when it does.
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: San Miguel keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
Lassi Lappalainen and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
54 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. HJK lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at HJK this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at HJK, and both men came out saying it was fine.
A year in and the city has not opened up, the language has not come, and lunch is eaten alone more often than anybody at HJK would admit. It shows on Saturdays.
A conversation in the manager’s office, and a commitment that came out of it. Promises like that are cheap to make and expensive to break, and Tuure Siira has written the date down.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Alfie Cicale signs something — a contract at HJK or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
“Ambitious players need ambitious projects. Draw your own conclusions.” Pyry Mentu’s representative said it with a smile, and made sure everyone wrote it down.
“Judge me on him.” Managers do not say that kind of thing by accident — it moves the pressure from Santeri Haarala’s shoulders onto his own, and both of them know it.
61 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. HJK lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at HJK this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Alexander Ring is on it.
He asked about his future and was given an answer with minutes in it. The manager has now made a promise in a building where promises are remembered, and the clock on it has started.
69 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. HJK lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
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.
Nobody at HJK will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
84 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. HJK lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
The demotion a club never announces and a dressing room always notices. Miska Ylitolva is further from the side than he was, and the reason will not be given until he asks.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and David Ezeh trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at HJK, another week without a signature from Emmanuel Boateng.
He asked about his future and was given an answer with minutes in it. The manager has now made a promise in a building where promises are remembered, and the clock on it has started.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Alfie Cicale signs something — a contract at HJK or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
99 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. HJK lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Kaius Simojoki and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Nobody at HJK will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at HJK, and both men came out saying it was fine.
The words a physio says slowly. 132 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Alfie Cicale was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Nobody makes a documentary about a hamstring and everybody in the game fears one. HJK will be careful with the return date, because the second one is always worse than the first.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Emmanuel Boateng will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around HJK the goodbyes have quietly begun.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at HJK this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at HJK, another week without a signature from Lassi Lappalainen.
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.
Nobody at HJK will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
“I respect the manager and I am not going to sit here and pretend I am happy.” It is the most common sentence in football and it has never once been the end of a story.
He asked about his future and was given an answer with minutes in it. The manager has now made a promise in a building where promises are remembered, and the clock on it has started.
SJK go through and HJK go home, 1‑1 the scoreline that did it. The dressing room will call the league the priority now, because that is what dressing rooms say.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at HJK is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
The board was up, the win was priced in, and then SJK scored. There is no worse minute to concede in and the ground emptied in the silence that follows one.
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.
Kaius Simojoki and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
The words a physio says slowly. 25 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around HJK they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at HJK this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and HJK know it.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mihailo Bogićević 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.
In brief
The dugoutAlexander Ring has become a man the manager trusts
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Mihailo Bogićević will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around HJK the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Mihailo Bogićević was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Lassi Lappalainen is on it.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Marcus Olsson trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Lassi Lappalainen signs something — a contract at HJK or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at HJK is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at HJK this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The manager has re-ordered his thinking and Nikolai Alho has come out of it lower. He will be told it is temporary, and the players who have heard that before will avoid his eye.
12 new signings in one window. Every one may be an upgrade and the side can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild the verdicts never mention.
Squad7 Sep 2026
A place in the month's best eleven for Teemu Pukki
Four or five weekends of consistency, judged against everybody in the division doing his job. Teemu Pukki has come out of that comparison in the side, and HJK have had the benefit of every one of those afternoons.