FinnPa (Finland)
Finland. When you look at Finish football
in depth, it is anything but something that ‘just exists’. This
next club that I am writing about rea. In played at the highest level in
Finland for many years, even qualifying for the UEFA cup at one point in their
history. Unfortunately, they do not exist in any sort of capacity anymore, but
that doesn’t mean they shall be forgotten about. The
club I am writing about is FinnPa. This is the second Finnish club I will have
covered. This is their story.
Founded in 1965 by the staff of Finish
national airline, Aero, and were named Aeron Pallo originally. The club was
named Finnairin Palloilijat or FinnPa which translates in English as ‘Ball
players of Finnair’ when the airline changed its name to
Finnair. The club wore an all-blue strip for their home colours and an
all-white strip for their away colours. Their first season the club, Aeron
Pallo, competed in Tier 5 of their district league, the Piirinsarja, which is
in Helsinki, the city the club were based. They got promoted in their first
season and played the 1967 season in Tier 4, the Aluesarja in the group 2
Helsinki section. This league was effiectivly the fourth tier of Finnish
football and was run by the Finnish FA. The club came first in their section
and won back to back promotions after only being two years old.
The 1968 season saw the club compete in
the third tier of Finnish football, the Maakuntasarja. They were placed in
Group 1 which consisted of clubs from Helsinki and Uusimaa. The club finished 6th
place, halting their early progress. The 1969 season was much the same, with
the club finishing 5th in their group meaning they would stay put in
the third division. In 1970 the league was renamed, and it was now called, III
Divisioona. The club placed 7th that season. The 1971 season saw
them faulter a bit and they were relegated to the fourth division, IV
Divisioona for the 1972 season, after placing 11th in their group.
They failed to gain promotion at the first time of asking, placing 3rd
but it wasn’t too long before they did get promoted
back to the Third Division, winning their group on the 1974 season. Once again,
the club had continued their momentum and completed back-to-back promotions for
the second time in their history, winning the III Divisioona title in 1975.
They even went one further this time and completed a hat-trick of promotions,
winning the II Divisioona East Group title to gain promotion to the I
Divisioona (First Division) for the first time in the club’s
history. But the 1977 season proved to be to be the limit of their quality at
the time and found themselves being relegated after just one season in the
second tier, placing 10th.
The club would spend another three
seasons in the II Divisioona, East Group, finishing 4th in the 1978
season and 7th in the 1979 season until the 1980 season when they
finally won promotion once again to the I Divisioona, coming 1st in
the West Group this time around. This time the club lasted much longer in the
countries second tier, competing in eight seasons in a row in I Divisioona,
with mixed results. The format had changed slightly, which gave FinnPa a
chance. They finished 11th in 1981, but that didn’t
relegate them. Instead, they were placed into a relegation group in which they
finished 4th, avoiding the drop. The 1982 season saw a big
improvement, with the club finishing 4th and qualifying for the
promotion group. Unfortunately, promotion was a step too far for FinnPa that
season and they finished 8th in their group, miles away from
reaching the top league in Finland. However, the dream remained alive, although
in the 1983 season the club finished 9th and had to compete in the
relegation group once again which they finished 3rd in and remained
in I Divisioona for another year. In fact, they would play another five seasons
in that division, finishing 8th in 1984, 7th in 1985, 7th
in 1986 and 7th in 1987. The 1988 season proved to be too much for
the club and thy finished 11th, dropping down to the third tier once
again. Their first season back in the third tier saw the club just miss out on
promotion, finishing 4th place, but the start of the 90’s
was to prove to be a good one for the club. In the 1990 season the club came 1st
in the East Group and gained promotion once again to the second tier of Finnish
football.
This time the club were looking to go one
further and gain promotion to the Veikkausliiga, Finish footballs top tier.
They didn’t waste any time in trying and in their
first season back in the second tier, the club finished 2nd,
qualifying for the promotion play-off. The didn’t win it and remained
in the I Divisioona for another year. But another year is all it took for
FinnPa to reach the promised land and the club rectified their loss in the
promotion play-off in 1991 by winning it in 1992, after once again coming 2nd
in the league. The club didn’t disappoint in their first season in the
top flight, qualifying for the Championship group, and finishing 5th
overall, winning thirteen games, drawing seven and losing nine. With another
change in format, the league was now without a Championship and relegation
group split and the end of each season. It would jyst be fourteen clubs
competing over 26 games in a full league format. The 1994 season saw FinnPa
Helsinki finish 10th out of those fourteen clubs, winning eight, drawing
nine and losing nine. Another solid season followed with the club finished
mid-table in 8th for the 1995 season, winning nine, drawing five and
losing twelve games. The 1996 season saw the return of the spilt league format
and FinnPa qualified for the Championship group, finishing 4th in
the regular season. They were to finish 4th in the Championship
group as well, just missing out on an Intertoto Cup place by two points.
It was the 1997 season that was arguably
the most successful one in the clubs history. After just missing out on
European qualification the season before, the club made a huge push the
following season and achieved their goal by finishing 3rd and
qualifying for the UEFA cup. It was a huge achievement by the club, in what was
another changed format in the Finnish top division. There were now only ten
clubs competing but that didn’t matter to FinnPa as they looked forward
to playing in Europe for the first time in their history. The 1998-99 UEFA cup
draw too place and FinnPA were drawn to play Israeli club, Hapoel Tel Aviv in
the first qualifying round. It was to be the furthest they would get in
European competition as they lost both home and away legs 3-1, losing on
aggregate 6-2.
The following season, the 1998 season was
to be FinnPa’s final one. They finished 9th
out of the ten teams in the Veikkausliiga, which saw them play a relegation
play-off against Tampereen Pallo-Veikot. They lost and it sent them back to the
second division. They won a total of five games that season, drawing eleven and
losing eleven. But FinnPa would never play in the second division the following
season as Finnair announced they would not be supporting the football club
finically anymore, meaning the club folded.
A story that many may be familiar with,
especially with clubs that were founded by companies or factories, that the
company it was founded from just decided to cut it costs and therefore the
football club had to cease. It has happened in countries all around the world,
some of these club’s feature in this book. I don’t
know the reasons for why FinnPa could not have tried to find other ways of
staying financially stable. They were, of course, based in the huge city of
Helsinki. Maybe those running the club felt the relegation was just too much to
overcome and that any revival would just be a waste of money. In any case,
FinnPa are not likely to ever remerge again, however they will never be
forgotten about and played their part in Finnish football history.