World Cup: 4 Nations Tournament - Team Finland (2025)

  • Xenforo Cloud will be upgrading us to version 2.3.5 on March 3rd at 12 AM GMT. This version has increased stability and fixes several bugs. We expect downtime for the duration of the update. The admin team will continue to work on existing issues, templates and upgrade all necessary available addons to minimize impact of this new version. Click Here for Updates
I'm by no means saying that losing Heiskanen doesn't hurt and that it's not a bummer to not see him playing here, but the silver lining here is that if any of this present group can even adequately fill in the role intended for Heiskanen, it creates a much better situation for the olympics next year. Having another d-man besides Heiskanen who's shown that he can do the same things for us that Miro can do is much better than just having Heiskanen alone.
 
  • Like
Reactions: heksagon
Since Heiskanen is out and with these recent trades with Granny & Rantanen I'd go with something like this.

Teräväinen-Barkov-Laine
Lehkonen-Aho-Rantanen
Kakko-Hintz-Granny
Luostarinen-Lundell-Armia

13th forward (Haula will not recover in time right?):
Kotkaniemi/Tolvanen

----------------

For PP:

Do you guys see a problem if we use one 5 forward PP unit or which defenders would you put on our PP unit(s)? I'm guessing Ristolainen would be the best D option for PP as much as I hate to say it ...

But here are my suggestions for 5 forward units:

Teräväinen - Kakko (mask) - Barkov
Laine - Granny

----------------

Aho - Lehkonen (mask) - Rantanen
Hintz - Lundell

Hintz seems to operate from same spot as Laine on the PP, so I don't want them to be in the same unit. Rantanen changes positions on the right side. Need them one timers. Lundell changes positions a lot and also would do a lot of masking duty here with Lehkonen.

----------------

For the PK, this leaves Luostarinen & Armia pair. Some players from the PP units will do double duty on special team moments.

Point producing defenders... Well, the best one is Lindell and that says a lot, but I'm not putting him to a PP unit, because he has so big role with PK. Big minutes for him.

vRkScbD.png
 
Well my interest for the tournament just plummeted. We've been waiting years for this and then the player that we absolutely can't be without gets injured by some idiot.

F**k Mark Stone

Hintz actually caused the injury ... From this review vid (angle & slow motion) . It seems pretty clear Stone didn't jump on Miro deliberately. It was unlucky.

 
  • Like
Reactions: Jussi and jj cale
I’d like to know how Finland does so well internationally, olympics and world juniors, but when I see their best on best on paper it is putrid.
 
I’d like to know how Finland does so well internationally, olympics and world juniors, but when I see their best on best on paper it is putrid.
skoda cup, olympics and juniors are mostly about coaching and playbook. on paper you wont notice it of course. also great goaltending is major reason.
 
Well my interest for the tournament just plummeted. We've been waiting years for this and then the player that we absolutely can't be without gets injured by some idiot.

F**k Mark Stone
eight years waiting just to see the only player who is absolutely mandatory to this team, injured week before the tournament.

see you again in next decade or something
 
I’d like to know how Finland does so well internationally, olympics and world juniors, but when I see their best on best on paper it is putrid.
If Finland constantly "overperforms" with "putrid" rosters, maybe it's time to consider that the players might be underrated. This roster for example has so many forwards who are great defensively, so only looking at stat sheets doesn't get you very far into analyzing how good they actually are. It might be a part of how Finns get coached from a young age, defending is very much considered a team effort. I don't buy that it's all playbook, cohesion and "sisu", although those matter too in a short tournament. You can't overperform year after year after year if the roster really sucks.

I don't think Finland is nearly as bad as people think even on paper. The paper is just being read wrong.

The defensive depth is unusually thin this time though, so the absence of Heiskanen is devastating. I don't think you can fully judge the current Finnish roster without him.
 
Last edited:

Ad

Upcoming events

Ad