“Things you’ve dreamed about as a little girl”

Lännen’s Aino-Kaisa Mantere was chosen as the best of the match. Silja Syrjälä hit the only winner of the ranking match.

Even the transfer of Manse PP, who had already secured victory in the women’s Superpesis regular season, to the East side and the selection of five players from Tampere in the East jersey did not change the balance of power in the women’s East-West match in baseball.

Lännen’s women have won 12 in a row, when on Saturday in Sotkamo, Lännen, built on the foundation of Pori’s Pesäkarhuje, saw a clear victory 2–0 (9–4, 5–1).

– When there is a 15-minute meeting, it makes it a lot easier that the players are in their standard positions familiar from the club teams, described Lännen’s victorious game manager Jarkko Pokela.

The players of Pesäkarhu, led by Pokela, scored seven runs, or half of the winners’ catch.

– I’ve always liked to involve the audience, and here they went all out, beamed the joker of Seinäjoki’s Maila-Jussie, who knocked out four runs individually for Länne Aino-Kaisa Mantere.

Mantere, 29, was awarded as the best player of the match.

– It’s pretty wild, after all, these are the kind of things you’ve dreamed about as a little girl. The goal was to score two runs, so now there were two more, Mantere rejoiced after the match on Puhe’s broadcast.

In Sotkamo, battered by rain showers in places, it was an entertaining match overall, as there were a whopping 34 three-pointers in the match.

Mantere, who sent his club team Seinäjoki Maila-Jussit into wild flight, played in the third East-West of his career.

– It was certainly an entertaining match. We saw some great shots on both sides and some great lunges. Really great outdoor and indoor play. There was no room for bad shots today.

Mantere said that he found space for his hitters, because some of the outfield players in the East team were already playing in foreign places.

– There he found places for himself, but the top team was against him. Today, we also clicked better in “risu”.

For Syrjälä, the only kunnar of the game

Länsi went on trips in the opening period, when Seinäjoki moved to Pesäkarhui for this season Silja Syrjälän Mansen’s header sneaked the second overtime shot Virp from Huka to landscapes worth three runs (1+2).

– After going to these games a few times, it was no longer exciting, Syrjälä described.

Syrjälä, 25, was chosen as the best of East-West two years ago in Pori. Ilmajokelaiskasvatti Syrjälä has been on the winning side four times.

Should Seinäjoki also be moved to the East side to make the game more even?

– Even with these divisions, this should have been a more even match. In certain moments, it certainly helped that we were familiar with the roles. We danced during the 25-minute period break with our captain Emilia Itävalon with management in the locker room to keep the mood up, Syrjälä stated.

The only player in the top six of the Western indoor game from outside Pesäkarhuje wore number two. Numerolla played Lapuan in the opening period Kaisa Peräaho and in the second period, Vaasan Riga Polso.

All awarded from the West

The awarded players of the East team were Manse PP’s progressive joker from Pori Kiira Kautto and Jyväskylä’s Kirittärie raumaine cooper and repatriator Tinja Töyrylä. All five awards of the match went to the players of the Western side.

– A loss is always sad, but we still offered the audience plenty of runs. Our roster should have been enough for an even better performance, Töyrylä stated.

The East’s previous win was in 2010. The all-time wins are 33–25 in favor of the West.

Quite a bit of history was made in the game, when the teams’ 26 players had 23 different breeding clubs. Only Hamina Balloliijat, Kankaanpää Maila and Ilmajoki Kisailaijat got two players in the game.