FC Honka 0 Racing Santander 1: Early goal puts an end to Honka dreams

Players must now focus on toppling Inter on Sunday

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FC Honka’s bid to get into the lucrative group stage of this year’s UEFA Cup ended on Thursday almost before it had begun, when Racing Santander - who had come to Finland with a one-goal advantage from the first leg in Spain - scored inside four minutes to put the Espoo team in an almost impossible position.
      A shot from around 20 metres clattered against the crossbar after a deflection by Rami Hakanpää, and while goalkeeper Tuomas Peltonen and the rest of the Honka defence looked on, Edu Bedia was first to the loose ball and rammed it home from close range.
     
This left Honka with the task of scoring three goals to win against a side that knew they were more than half-way there.
      The Racing defence were of a mind to let Honka have the ball, thus giving a rather false impression of the home side’s prowess, but shut them down brusquely every time they approached the penalty area.
      Racing also cannily forced Honka to play - against their normal style - a long-ball game that ultimately proved fruitless.
      Aleksander Kokko, the top-scorer in the domestic Veikkaus League this season, had a gilt-edged cance to get Honka back on terms just before the interval, but Racing’s goalkeeper Antonio Rodriguez dealt with the shot and with everything else that came his way.
     
It was a disappointment for the more than 9,000 who turned up to watch in atrocious conditions.
      For a good many of them, they did not even see the goal that settled matters: hundreds were still queueing to get in as Bedia put the ball away and put Honka’s hopes to bed.
      Naturally this set the 500 or so travelling fans singing, but Honka’s slightly smaller contingent of hardcore supporters down the other end gave as good as they got.
     
Honka will now need to pick themselves up and prepare for Sunday’s match against FC Inter in Turku.
      As the two league leaders clash, the prize for victory on Sunday is very likely to be the Finnish title and a ticket back into Europe next season.
      Inter head the table on goal difference with three rounds to go.
     
Thursday night saw three big sports events in Helsinki in the space of a few square kilometres.
      While Honka were being beaten in the rain in the Finnair Stadium, HIFK Helsinki came out 4-2 ahead of last year’s Finnish ice hockey champions Oulu Kärpät in the old Ice Hall about 100 metres to the north.
      This match was attended by 5,445 spectators.
      There would probably have been more ice hockey fans in the hall to witness the only home win of the night, but coincidentally Helsinki Jokerit were playing a friendly exhibition game against the Pittsburgh Penguins in the Hartwall Arena.
     
The arrival of last year’s beaten Stanley Cup finalists had already caused a stampede for tickets when they went on sale in April, and a full house of 13,464 saw the Penguins, with NHL superstar Sidney Crosby in the line-up, take Jokerit apart to win 4-1.
      The NHL season gets under way on Saturday in Stockholm, when Pittsburgh play Ottawa.
      Next year it may well be that rather than a warm-up game like this one, Helsinki will host at least one official NHL fixture as the league seeks to expand its global reach.


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Honka rely on short passing game and twin strikers for Santander test (2.10.2008)

Links:
  FC Honka (Wikipedia)

Helsingin Sanomat