Finland produced arguably their worst performance of the year in Helsinki this evening against a mediocre Georgia side who seemed happy to come away with a draw. A questionable team selection and a handful of stupid decisions by the players on the pitch made Finland work much harder than they needed to.
The majority of the game’s talking points came in a frantic 10-minute period in the second half. After an evenly matched but rather underwhelming opening 45 minutes, Finland returned from the interval with much more attacking intent. The 53rd minute brought their best chance of the match so far, with a move that went through both Eremenko brothers to Jukka Raitala on the right wing. He delivered an excellent cross which an unchallenged Tim Sparv rose to meet. The goal was there for the taking, but Sparv got his header all wrong, connecting only with the back of his head, and the ball fell instead to Kasper Hämäläinen arriving at the far post. He tried desperately to turn the ball back in, but he was already at such a tight angle that he could only manage to hit the outside of the post.
The game flowed from end to end following that chance, until a couple of minutes later Georgia won a corner off the leg of Juhani Ojala. The delivery took a completely unintentional deflection off Guram Kashia and crept into the Finnish goal, catching Niki Mäenpää by surprise. It may have been against the balance of play in the second half, but it felt like a fitting punishment for Finland for missing such a glorious chance moments earlier.
Things went from bad to worse for the home side another couple of minutes down the line. Alexei Eremenko Jr, making his first competitive start since the 5-0 loss to Sweden last year, picked up his second yellow card and received his marching orders. It was one of the most pointless red cards imaginable. His first yellow card had been for dissent after the Ukrainian match referee had not given him a free kick in the first half, and his second was for a “hand of god” moment as he made contact with a cross with his outstretched arms. Mixu Paatelainen went on to say that it was a reflexive action, and that much was clear from Eremenko’s reaction; he knew immediately what he had done and headed for the tunnel in shame before the referee had even reached for his pocket. Nevertheless, it reflected very poorly on his manager, who had announced Eremenko’s recall in the pre-match press conference, where he made a point of talking up his abilities and fitness.
Being reduced to ten men forced Paatelainen into making his first change of the match, as Perparim Hetemaj, left out of the starting line-up to make room for Eremenko Jr, came on for the largely ineffective Teemu Pukki. That change pushed Kasper Hämäläinen forward into the lone striker’s position, which soon brought its reward. In the 62nd minute, Sparv made amends for his earlier miss with an incisive long pass down Finland’s left side, which found Hämäläinen. A deft drop of his shoulder left Zurab Khizanishvili tripping over himself, after which the Djurgården player slotted the ball past Nukri Revishvili and into the far corner of the net. It was a pleasing goal to watch, one that took no small amount of confidence and skill from Hämäläinen to pull off, and all the more so given that Finland had pulled themselves back into the match despite being a man down. Finland’s captain, Niklas Moisander, praised Hämäläinen’s performance after the match, noting that he doesn’t play as a striker for his club but has impressed in the role for Finland recently.
That disadvantage allowed Georgia to enjoy the lion’s share of possession in the remaining half hour, and it was largely thanks to Niki Mäenpää that Finland remained level. The Venlo goalkeeper, starting his first competitive international match after impressing against the Czech Republic last month, was called into action three or four times, but he was more than up for the challenge. Paatelainen indicated that he will be selected for the forthcoming friendly against Cyprus as well, which makes sense; Mäenpää has already impressed with his reflexes and command of the penalty area, but needs more experience if he is to become Finland’s new permanent number one.
The match finished 1-1, and Finland were left to reflect on what went wrong in a match they could easily have won. Georgia played smartly, wasting time when it suited them and generally winding up their opponents, which led to the aforementioned dissent, which was also on show from Roman Eremenko and Alexander Ring, while Perparim Hetemaj picked up a silly yellow card for diving in the last few minutes of the game. There were also a worrying number of rash lunges from Finnish players that would easily have merited bookings had they made any contact. None of that excuses the poor performance and result, though, and both coach and captain expressed their regret that the team couldn’t pick up three points.
“We had the ball a lot in the first half, as we had wanted, but we couldn’t create chances. In the second half we had an unlucky goal go against us and then a stupid red card, which made it really difficult. I’m proud of how we fought back and at least got a draw, but we went for the win today and didn’t get it, so it’s disappointing,” said Moisander.
“We were ineffective,” condeded Paatelainen. “There wasn’t enough concentration from our players. Even though we were the better team, we didn’t ask enough questions of Georgia’s defence. We still tried to attack after the red card, but we didn’t want to play in a kamikaze style. Against France we improved in the second half after a poor first half, but here it was the other way round.”
| Team line-ups |
| FINLAND (4-5-1) |
GEORGIA (x-y-z) |
| 1. Niki Mäenpää (GK) |
1. Nukri Revishvili (GK) |
| 3. Niklas Moisander (C) |
2. Sandro Kobakhidze |
| 4. Juhani Ojala |
3. Gia Grigalava |
| 7. Roman Eremenko |
4. Guram Kashia |
| 10. Teemu Pukki |
5. Aleksandre Amisulashvili |
| 14. Tim Sparv |
6. Zurab Khizanishvili |
| 18. Jere Uronen |
7. Jaba Kankava (C) |
| 19. Alexander Ring |
8. Murtaz Daushvili |
20. Alexei Eremenko Jr  |
9. Davit Targamadze |
| 21. Kasper Hämäläinen |
10. Tornike Okriashvili  |
| 22. Jukka Raitala |
11. Levan Mchedlidze |
Substitutions:
8. Perparim Hetemaj
(for Teemu Pukki, 62)
| Substitutions:
20. Davit Devdariani
(for Levan Mchedlidze, 59)
17. Jano Ananidze
(for Tornike Okriashvili, 67)
21. Levan Kenia
(for Davit Targamadze, 81)
|
Observations
Finland’s best performers tonight were Kasper Hämäläinen, who took his goal superbly, Niki Mäenpää, who kept his team in the game and further staked his claim to be first-choice, and Jere Uronen, who showed impressive confidence to run past players and make crosses in what was his competitive debut. Their worst perfomer has to be Eremenko Jr, who frequently misplaced passes and failed to have much of an impact going forward, in addition to his stupid sending off. His brother Roman Eremenko also had a quiet night, while Alexander Ring looked flustered right from the start and made too many poor decisions. Teemu Pukki was anonymous, but I feel it would be wrong to put all of the blame on him for that, as he was playing on his own up front and didn’t get the necessary support to be effective. He had a couple of nice runs and touches, but didn’t have a single shot in the match.
Finland needed to win this match to give their confidence a boost and increase the likelihood of them finishing third in their qualifying group. Things are only going to get more difficult from this point onwards: their next match is away to Spain next March, an utterly daunting task. After that comes a home match against Belarus, which has now become a must-win game if Finland are to muster anything approaching a respectable points tally from this campaign. It’s understandable, and commendable, that Finland are buildling for their future, but they need results along the way to show that they are making progress. Tonight was a perfect opportunity to do that, and they wasted it.
Finland vs Georgia 
A first-half goal from Teemu Pukki and a heroic performance from Niki Mäenpää were enough to give Finland a surprising 0-1 victory over the Czech Republic in Teplice on Tuesday night.
Czech Republic vs Finland