"Has it managed to bite anyone?"

Some things don't change

print this

By Tommi Nieminen
     
      I came across a cartoon by the late Kari Suomalainen, which was first published in Helsingin Sanomat seventeen years ago, or to be precise in the edition of April 13th, 1988.
      The drawing shows a horrendous, seven-foot-tall, completely berserk ice hockey player in the Helsinki HIFK strip, who has been led to a veterinarian's surgery.
      Kari Suomalainen, the paper's long-serving and much-loved cartoonist, drew the picture after HIFK players had used extremely rough tactics on the ice against Tappara of Tampere. At the same time in early 1988, a number of cases of rabies were reported among wild animals in Finland.
      In March 2005, HIFK were ordered by the Finnish Ice Hockey Association to pay EUR 8,000 in fines following a mass brawl instigated by their players in a play-off defeat against Rauma Lukko.
      At the beginning of April, the incident continued to make waves, when the same fight on the ice wound up being investigated by the police as a possible case of assault. Although charges have not been brought, history has repeated itself in the case of the violent rink behaviour of HIFK players.
      Fortunately the society has made some progress since 1988.
      We have at least got rid of rabies in the wild.
     
Helsingin Sanomat / First published in print 17.4.2005


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Brawling is a part of ice hockey (30.3.2005)

TOMMI NIEMINEN / Helsingin Sanomat
tommi.nieminen@hs.fi