An individual honour is a strange thing in a team game, and the best of them are never argued with. He has had the sort of year that ends with his name being read out, and KuPS have had the benefit of it.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at KuPS is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Kasim Adams 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 one award on the pitch nobody else can win. 10 games in a season in which nobody scored past him, and a career that will be measured against this one.
16 games, 0 goals, and a squad option that has arrived without a fee attached. The interesting question at KuPS now is not whether he plays but who he displaces.
The manager has re-ordered his thinking and Niilo Kujasalo 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.
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.
HJK go through and KuPS go home, 0‑2 the scoreline that did it. The dressing room will call the league the priority now, because that is what dressing rooms say.
Position 3, 37 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
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.
10 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
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.
Successful dribbles: 12. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
Valentín Gasc 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 KuPS 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 KuPS, and both men came out saying it was fine.
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.
Numbers do not stay secret in a dressing room and never have. He is not asking for more than he is worth; he is asking why somebody beside him is worth more, and at KuPS that is a harder question to answer.
The language has come, the shrug has gone, and he argues in training like a man who expects to be here next year. None of it shows up on a fee and all of it shows up on the pitch.
18 graduates, from a department now rated 9 out of 20. Nothing about the academy appears in a result, and nothing about the club’s future exists without it.
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.
“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 KuPS know it.
Aapo Boström 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.
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.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. KuPS know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
The shrug has gone, the language is coming, and he now argues in training like somebody who expects to be here next year. Half a signing's value is this and none of it appears on a fee.
In brief
The dugoutThe manager plants his flag on Jaime Moreno
SquadJaime Moreno is the talk of the training ground
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Akseli Puukko will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around KuPS the goodbyes have quietly begun.
“Three loans in three years. At some point a club has to decide if I am their player or their asset.” The spell at Inter Turku continues; the message travels home.
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 Calvin Kabuye is on it.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. KuPS know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
He used to be one of the options. He is now one of the men the options are picked around, and the change happened quietly enough that only the dressing room noticed on the day.
Numbers do not stay secret in a dressing room. He is not asking for more than he is worth; he is asking why somebody beside him is worth more, and KuPS have no good answer.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Oscar Häggström trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
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.
Nobody at KuPS 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.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. KuPS know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Souleymane Soumahoro trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
“I have done everything asked of me in training and it has not changed a thing on a Saturday.” The most familiar complaint in football, and one KuPS will have to answer with minutes or with a transfer.
“Judge me on him.” Managers do not say that kind of thing by accident — it moves the pressure from Saku Savolainen’s shoulders onto his own, and both of them know it.
In brief
SquadSaku Heiskanen is training like a man with a point to make
Taneli Hämäläinen 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.
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 Jaime Moreno is on 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 KuPS, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Saku Savolainen has done the arithmetic and does not like the answer. Nothing corrodes a squad faster, and no club has ever solved it by explaining the wage structure to a footballer.
In brief
SquadThe selectors could not leave Kasim Adams out
The last league game has been played and the table has stopped moving: 37 points. The summer begins on Monday, and so does the argument about what it all meant.
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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Akseli Puukko 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.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Akseli Puukko will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around KuPS 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 KuPS this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at KuPS, and 9 appearances in 27 say he has earned the hearing.
Squad6 Sep 2027
A place in the month's best eleven for Aapo Boström
Four or five weekends of consistency, judged against everybody in the division doing his job. Aapo Boström has come out of that comparison in the side, and KuPS have had the benefit of every one of those afternoons.
Nobody at KuPS 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.
Nothing is announced when this happens and everybody knows. He is a bigger part of the plan at KuPS than he was a month ago, and the training ground worked that out before the team sheet said so.
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against SJK in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. KuPS know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Saku Heiskanen will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around KuPS the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Valentín Gasc 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.
He won it back and then made something of it, which is two jobs and the reason the scoreline looks the way it does. 10 combined actions and a mark of 6.93, and not one of them will make a highlights package.
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation KuPS are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
In brief
The dugoutPiotr Parzyszek has become a man the manager trusts
Player ratingsThe chances came and went for Calvin Kabuye
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and KTP waiting with a shirt. Nobody at KuPS is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
“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 KuPS, and it is not being withdrawn.
Boardroom23 Aug 2027
Deadline passes with 15 signed and 10 gone
That is the business done at KuPS 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.
The deal with TPS 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.
A deal that was a phone call from completion at lunchtime was dead by midnight. KuPS will try again when the window opens; JäPS may not be selling by then.
Marked 8.05 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and SalPa waiting with a shirt. Nobody at KuPS is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
Transfer targets16 Aug 2027
$1.5M settles it between the clubs for Emil Pallas
JäPS have accepted the money. What KuPS do not yet have is the man, and between here and the photograph is a conversation about wages that both sides are dreading.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Everything was agreed with Hammarby and then the doctor spoke. KuPS have walked away from a signing on the advice of somebody who never saw him play, which is how it is supposed to work.
The chase for Albijon Muzaci ended with $120.0K changing hands and TPS out of reasons to say no. The supporters will judge the fee the only way that matters: on Saturdays.
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at KuPS can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. FC Midtjylland have kept their man, and KuPS go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
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.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. KuPS have lost him in all but the paperwork.
The offer from Vikingur for Osku Maukonen was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
The deal with Hammarby 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 chase for Peetu Haikonen ended with $330.0K changing hands and JäPS out of reasons to say no. The supporters will judge the fee the only way that matters: on Saturdays.
The offer went to TPS this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. KuPS have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Position 3, 30 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
The accountants will call it good business and they will be right, which is not the point anybody outside the boardroom is making. Saikou Touray was one of the reasons people came, and $1.9M does not replace that by itself.
The offer went to JäPS this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.
Taneli Hämäläinen 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 last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. KuPS have lost him in all but the paperwork.
KuPS had done everything except persuade the man himself. He stays at Brondby, and the manager goes back to the drawing board with the money still in the bank.
KuPS have gone to TPS with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.
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.
Inter Turku next, and the two sides the division is watching meet each other. Whoever wins will be told nothing is decided in the same breath as being congratulated.
100 games in this shirt, through managers and relegations and everything else. Service like it is disappearing from the game and the crowd knows what it is watching.
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.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 7.83 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
“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.
Nobody makes a documentary about a hamstring and everybody in the game fears one. KuPS will be careful with the return date, because the second one is always worse than the first.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Saku Savolainen was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
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.
Player ratings19 Jul 2027
Saku Savolainen was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.50. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
Arttu Heinonen 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. 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.
Something was said to Otto Kemppainen and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
Nobody at KuPS 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.
“There are things I liked and things we will be doing on Tuesday until they are right.” 0‑0, and a manager who had already decided what Tuesday looked like.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 14 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
One weekend, judged against everybody else's. Piotr Parzyszek has come out on top of it, and for most footballers a weekly award is the only silverware a career ever produces.
Position 2, 25 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
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.
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.
2 goals before the ground had finished arriving. KTP spent the rest of the afternoon playing a match that had already been decided, and everybody in the stadium knew it.
“Every summer it is another club, another set of team-mates, another manager to convince. I have done all that. Now I want a pre-season at KuPS and a proper look at me.” He remains Inter Turku’s player until the spell runs out — but the argument is with the club that owns him.
A 2‑1 win over SalPa, and the draw for the next round can be watched with some interest for once.
Match23 Jun 2027
Akseli Puukko wins it after the whistle should have gone
100 minutes played. Akseli Puukko found the finish in time that only existed because of earlier delays, and SalPa went from a point to nothing inside one movement.
Player ratings28 Jun 2027
Akseli Puukko, 20, plays like he has been here for years — 8.16
A mark of 8.16 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 20-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
7.32, 1 on the scoresheet, and the specific comedy of a back-four player celebrating like somebody who does this every week. He does not, and that is exactly why the ground reacted the way it did.
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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 20-year-old it feels ownership of. Akseli Puukko 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.
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.
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.
Half the programme played, position 2, 22 on the board. Doubling it is the sum every supporter has done and the only one nobody at the club will do out loud.
Aapo Boström 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.
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.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.08 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
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.
“The players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 2‑1, Eero Pukki could afford to be generous.
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.
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.
Jonathan Asp-Jensen 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.
“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 KuPS know it.
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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Liam Möller 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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Piotr Parzyszek. 1‑0 against Ekenäs IF, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
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.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at KuPS, and 3 appearances in 13 say he has earned the hearing.
“The players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 1‑0, Eero Pukki could afford to be generous.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at KuPS 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 KuPS this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
The door stayed shut a long time after the final whistle. What was said in there is between them; whether it worked is between them and Saturday.
The dugout24 May 2027
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 0‑3 defeat, delivered by Eero Pukki to a room that had heard them before.
5 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.
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.
“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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Saku Savolainen was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Every run ends on an afternoon somebody had marked down as routine. This one went 5 matches, which is long enough that a town had stopped counting, and short enough that it will remember exactly who stopped it.
Aapo Boström 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.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Eero Pukki after 0‑2, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
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 Jaime Moreno is on it.
The dugout17 May 2027
The manager has not finished forgetting Aapo Boström's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
5 wins on the spin now, and the question has changed from whether the run ends to who ends it. Confidence like this cannot be bought; it has to be earned exactly this way.
“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.
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.
At 21 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
3 straight away victories. Sides that win away are usually sides that can defend and can counter, and the table has begun to reflect what those journeys have earned.
Squad10 May 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.
Player ratings10 May 2027
Saku Savolainen was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.01. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Otto Ruoppi did not need any: 8.24, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
4 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
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.
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.
At 21 he was better than everybody his age in the division for four weeks running, which is harder than one good afternoon. KuPS will try not to make too much of it.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Piotr Parzyszek provided it, and the 9.09 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
There were 6 saves in it, and at least three that had no business being saves at all. The ten outfield players owe him a drink and they know it.
Player ratings26 Apr 2027
Otto Ruoppi, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 7.67
A mark of 7.67 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Akseli Puukko will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around KuPS the goodbyes have quietly begun.
3 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
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.
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.
A mark of 8.16 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
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.
At 22 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
Squad19 Apr 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.
“I did not go to FC Lahti to sit and watch. I want to come back to KuPS and fight for my place.” 1 appearances in 9 matches say the rest.
The dugout19 Apr 2027
The manager’s verdict
“I am not going to get carried away and I will not let them either. It was a good day. There will be harder ones.” Eero Pukki kept it short after the 3‑0 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
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 Otto Ruoppi is on it.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and SalPa waiting with a shirt. Nobody at KuPS is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Jonathan Asp-Jensen did not need any: 8.28, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
The deal that would have taken Calvin Kabuye to HJK has collapsed at the last stage, and he reports back to KuPS with a summer to forget and a season still to play. Nobody is saying which side walked away.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at KuPS is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
A defender on the scoresheet, which happens rarely enough that everybody in the ground remembers who took the corner. 1 for him, and a mark of 7.72 for the rest of it.
5 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.
In brief
SquadWords at KuPS training over how hard people work
“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.
Boardroom5 Apr 2027
KuPS close the window on a squad of their own making
8 in and 8 out, and no more changes for months. The manager has what he has, the supporters have their opinion of it, and the table will have the last word.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. FC Lahti have kept their man, and KuPS go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Doni Arifi 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 enquiry everybody at KuPS was hoping would not arrive has arrived. He has never pretended he did not want to go back, and now there is somewhere to go back to.
“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 KuPS know it.
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.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and JIPPO waiting with a shirt. Nobody at KuPS is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
The deal with Greuther Fürth 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.
6 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
Aapo Boström 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.
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 words a physio says slowly. 16 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.
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Lausanne-Sport keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
At 19 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Saku Savolainen 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.
“I watch every KuPS game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at FC Lahti runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
In brief
The dugoutOtto Ruoppi has become a man the manager trusts
25 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. KuPS lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around KuPS people have started saying his name in the past tense.
KuPS had done everything except persuade the man himself. He stays at Vicenza, and the manager goes back to the drawing board with the money still in the bank.
KuPS have gone to FC Lahti with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.
Add another name to the list: HJK have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Samuel Pasanen. The answer from KuPS has not changed — yet.
“Some mornings you wake up and you are still a long way from everything you know.” It is not the football and it never was; KuPS are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Saku Savolainen 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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. ADO Den Haag have kept their man, and KuPS go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Liam Möller 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. 34 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.
“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.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. KuPS have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Jonathan Asp-Jensen 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.
Aapo Boström was the name on every phone-in, and the club has gone and signed him for $720.0K. For one week the board can do no wrong, which is a week most boards never get.
“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 KuPS know it.
The words a physio says slowly. 41 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.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around KuPS people have started saying his name in the past tense.
The bid was some way short and KuPS did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Transfer targets1 Mar 2027
$720.0K settles it between the clubs for Aapo Boström
SJK have accepted the money. What KuPS do not yet have is the man, and between here and the photograph is a conversation about wages that both sides are dreading.
Gustav Engvall has gone, the accounts have $620.0K in them, and the supporters have the feeling of having been sold something themselves. Good business and a good decision are not always the same thing.
“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 KuPS know it.
The words a physio says slowly. 48 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.
The offer from SalPa for Akseli Puukko was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Saku Savolainen was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
James Bogere 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.
KuPS have made the call to Deportivo La Coruña. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
A loan enquiry to Red Bull Salzburg: cover, or a look at somebody the club cannot afford to buy yet. Either way the answer will come back inside the week.
56 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. KuPS lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
The chase for Oscar Häggström ended with $140.0K changing hands and TPS out of reasons to say no. The supporters will judge the fee the only way that matters: on Saturdays.
The name of Samuel Pasanen has come up in conversations KuPS were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Karo Räsänen was the name on every phone-in, and the club has gone and signed him for $330.0K. For one week the board can do no wrong, which is a week most boards never get.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. FC Lahti have kept their man, and KuPS go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Jerry Voutilainen 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 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.
Red Bull Salzburg have been asked whether they would lend him. Loans are agreed quickly or not at all, and this one will be one or the other by the weekend.
63 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. KuPS lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Transfer targets8 Feb 2027
$330.0K settles it between the clubs for Karo Räsänen
PK-35 have accepted the money. What KuPS do not yet have is the man, and between here and the photograph is a conversation about wages that both sides are dreading.
Add another name to the list: FC Lahti have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Niilo Kujasalo. The answer from KuPS has not changed — yet.
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 KuPS 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.
70 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. KuPS lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
“Some mornings you wake up and you are still a long way from everything you know.” It is not the football and it never was; KuPS are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
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.
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Jerry Voutilainen has his answer from KuPS; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
77 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. KuPS lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
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.
Nobody at KuPS 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.
The words a physio says slowly. 85 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Saku Savolainen was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Nobody at KuPS 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 KuPS, and both men came out saying it was fine.
93 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. KuPS lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Saku Savolainen was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Valentín Gasc 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.
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 Jaime Moreno is on it.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Saikou Touray was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The manager has re-ordered his thinking and Karl Ward 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 Arttu Heinonen is on it.
He used to be one of the options. He is now one of the men the options are picked around, and the change happened quietly enough that only the dressing room noticed on the day.
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.
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.
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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Saku Savolainen 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.
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 Piotr Parzyszek is on it.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Joslyn Luyeye-Lutumba 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 Joslyn Luyeye-Lutumba signs something — a contract at KuPS or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
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 Saku Heiskanen has written the date down.
0‑3 against AGF. The honest reading is not that the players were poor; it is that the distance between this club and that one is currently measured in things money takes years to buy.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Saikou Touray was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Nobody at KuPS 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Saku Savolainen was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
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.
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 Arttu Heinonen is on it.
36 months left and silence from upstairs — no offer, no talks, nothing for his people to answer. Clubs that let a calendar do their negotiating usually end up negotiating with the calendar.
1 months left, and both sides know what that means: every week without a signature, the fee KuPS could ask drops and the wages Joslyn Luyeye-Lutumba can ask rise.
8 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.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at KuPS is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
“Some mornings you wake up and you are still a long way from everything you know.” It is not the football and it never was; KuPS are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Squad30 Nov 2026
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.
Behind, and beaten by any honest reading, until minute 91. Rosenborg had the points in their pocket and a corner of the ground still believed, which is generally when it happens.
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.
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 Otto Ruoppi is on it.
In brief
The dugoutThe view from the dugout
The dugoutThe team sheet said everything about Valentín Gasc
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.
Valentín Gasc 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.
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.
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.
Nobody at KuPS 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.
Saku Savolainen has done the arithmetic and does not like the answer. Nothing corrodes a squad faster, and no club has ever solved it by explaining the wage structure to a footballer.
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 Gustav Engvall has written the date down.
1‑2 away to the standard of Galatasaray. Nobody will pretend this was a scandal; the gap is real, it is measurable, and closing it is a project rather than a team talk.
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.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at KuPS is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad2 Nov 2026
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.
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 Otto Ruoppi is on it.
It will be explained as a change for the team and it may even be one. Nobody who has worn one believes that, and neither does the man who has just had it taken away.
0‑3. There is a level at which football is played every single week by clubs that have been doing it for fifty years, and an evening like this is what it feels like to arrive there without having done it.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at KuPS is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Saku Savolainen 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.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Eero Pukki after 0‑3, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
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.
Valentín Gasc 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.
13 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
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 Jaime Moreno is on it.
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 Niilo Kujasalo has written the date down.
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.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at KuPS, and 0 appearances in 9 say he has earned the hearing.
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. KuPS told Joslyn Luyeye-Lutumba something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
The dugout12 Oct 2026
The manager has not finished forgetting Calvin Kabuye's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
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.
1‑2 away to the standard of AGF. Nobody will pretend this was a scandal; the gap is real, it is measurable, and closing it is a project rather than a team talk.
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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Saku Savolainen 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.
The dugout5 Oct 2026
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 1‑2 defeat, delivered by Eero Pukki to a room that had heard them before.
He found out with everybody else, an hour before kick-off, from a sheet of paper on a wall. Nobody at KuPS pretended it was anything other than a decision about him.
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.
He wheeled away like a man who had been carrying it for months, because he had. KuPS have their signing off the mark and one press-conference question retired.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Arttu Lötjönen will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around KuPS the goodbyes have quietly begun.
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at KuPS can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Saku Savolainen was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Valentín Gasc 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 KuPS 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.
1‑3 against Rosenborg, and an evening that measured the gap rather than the ninety minutes. Nothing about it was a disgrace and nothing about it was close.
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.
13 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.
He found out with everybody else, an hour before kick-off, from a sheet of paper on a wall. Nobody at KuPS pretended it was anything other than a decision about him.
At 36 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 7.86 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
21 times he got in the way of something. Centre-halves get written about when they make mistakes and ignored when they do not, so an afternoon like this needs saying out loud: he is the reason the scoreline reads as it does.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Saku Savolainen 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.
Minute 87, against Ekenäs IF, and a goal that felt like a win to everybody who had stayed. It was a draw. Nobody leaving the ground will describe it as one.
“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 KuPS, and it is not being withdrawn.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Souleymane Soumahoro will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around KuPS the goodbyes have quietly begun.
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.
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.
The demotion a club never announces and a dressing room always notices. Saikou Touray is further from the side than he was, and the reason will not be given until he asks.
Squad7 Sep 2026
A place in the month's best eleven for Otto Ruoppi
Four or five weekends of consistency, judged against everybody in the division doing his job. Otto Ruoppi has come out of that comparison in the side, and KuPS have had the benefit of every one of those afternoons.
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.
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.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.24 at 35, and nobody on the pitch was better.
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.
Squad31 Aug 2026
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.
KuPS ran out of time with AC Oulu. The paperwork was open when the deadline passed, and a transfer that was almost done is now a transfer that never happened.
Valentín Gasc 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Otto Kemppainen 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.
A mark of 8.44 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 18-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
The deal that would have taken Joslyn Luyeye-Lutumba to Ilves has collapsed at the last stage, and he reports back to KuPS with a summer to forget and a season still to play. Nobody is saying which side walked away.
KuPS offered $290.0K; HJK said it was not close. The manager will be told the money is still there for the right player, which is what managers are told.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Saikou Touray was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The paperwork is done long before the player is. Irfan Sadik has agreed terms to come here when his current deal runs out, which means KuPS have spent a summer's transfer budget on a phone call.
At 20 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
Squad24 Aug 2026
13 new faces, and KuPS are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
At 35 every good afternoon gets called a throwback, and this one was: 8.13, and nobody on the pitch better.
Boardroom17 Aug 2026
KuPS close the window on a squad of their own making
14 in and 1 out, and no more changes for months. The manager has what he has, the supporters have their opinion of it, and the table will have the last word.
$560.0K on the table at AC Oulu. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
The number the board signed off was not enough. It has been asked again and raised its own offer to $300.0K — a club that wants Brooklyn Lyons-Foster enough to be asked twice.
The rules permit it and it stings anyway. Arttu Lötjönen has agreed terms with AC Oulu for the summer, and until then he pulls on this shirt as a player who has already chosen his next one.
The offer went to HJK this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.
The fee is $300.0K, the contract is signed, and the argument about whether he is worth it can begin. AC Oulu drove a hard bargain; time will say who won it.
Otto Kemppainen was the name on every phone-in, and the club has gone and signed him for $300.0K. For one week the board can do no wrong, which is a week most boards never get.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. KuPS have lost him in all but the paperwork.
The number the board signed off was not enough. It has been asked again and raised its own offer to $315.0K — a club that wants Otto Kemppainen enough to be asked twice.
The deal with Dinamo Bucharest 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.
He will play here until the summer and then walk out of the door for free, having already signed elsewhere. Supporters will manage the first part of that sentence; it is the second they will struggle with.
KuPS have gone to AC Oulu with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at KuPS can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Saikou Touray was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Nothing happens for months and then he simply arrives, at no cost, having signed a pre-contract while still turning out for somebody else. It is the least dramatic way to sign a footballer and frequently the shrewdest.
268 appearances across 14 seasons in one shirt. Careers like that are not built on purpose any more, and KuPS know exactly what they have.
Player ratings3 Aug 2026
Otto Ruoppi, 20, plays like he has been here for years — 8.39
A mark of 8.39 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 20-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
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.
KuPS asked and Brasil de Pelotas said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
He is 20 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.
The name of Eemil Tanninen has come up in conversations KuPS were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Behind, and beaten by any honest reading, until minute 97. VPS had the points in their pocket and a corner of the ground still believed, which is generally when it happens.