Half of Finland’s team. Kärpät of Oulu.
Admired, envied, wins on and off the rink grabbed by a big club.
The turnover of the Oulun Kärpät Oy group was a whopping 33.8 million euros in the last fiscal year. In addition to sports activities, the group also includes event and restaurant business.
Kärpät has done financially what all other league teams dream of.
But it doesn’t work on the ice level now.
As I write this, on November 22, 2024, Kärpät is in tenth place in the SM league standings. The people of Oulu have taken only six three-point wins when more than a third of the regular season has been played.
Flies are flowing towards a sporting crisis. The question is, of course: why?
You should look for the root causes a few years ago.
The 2010s were the dynasty of the Kärppie. Three championships, four final places, five medals. The cash register sang Jamppa Tuominen To the tune of “Kärpät on ruata” ringing, when businesses expanded beyond hockey.
The streak of financial success continued, but the sporting streak was interrupted. The flies fell far from the tip. Last spring, the people of Oulu unexpectedly won bronze, but right now it looks like some kind of a stroke of luck.
Kärpät did not know how to regenerate
Kärpät has not succeeded in what Tappara succeeded.
Tappara reformed when he was at the top. The flies should have done the same five years ago.
Winning is dangerous in sports. It may blind you to the need for continuous renewal.
The renewal of the axe-breasts happened perfectly, but Kärpät did not know how or dare to renew himself. He told about it in his own language Lauri Marjamäki hiring as the team’s head coach in February 2022.
Marjamäki brought huge success to Kärpi in the last decade. In Oulu, it was thought that when Marjamäki is brought back to Oulu, success will also return at the same time.
It was the other way around.
Leadership and experience
How to renew? What is needed for renewal? Kärpät is still struggling with those questions.
Marjamäki was fired last season. Having taken his place Ville Mäntymaa got a fresh start to his head coaching career in the spring. For a while, it looked as if a new athletic upswing could start.
During this fall, the increase quickly turned into a decrease. Playing as a team does not guarantee in any area. The goalkeepers have also failed badly. Kärpät finds a few exceptional individuals, such as Reid Gardiner and Teemu Turunenin reserve.
Renovating operations requires leadership in every field. And I understand that leadership requires at least some experience. Where are the leadership and experience of Oulu Kärppie?
Mäntymaa is now piloting his first full season as head coach. He works as a sports director Mikko Myllykoski. He is almost as inexperienced in his role as Mäntymaa as head coach. Myllykoski started working as a sports director just over a year ago.
A player legend Lasse Kukkonen was recruited in spring 2022 as Kärppie’s director of development. Kukkonen was a real leader as a player, but as the boss of a sports club, he is a newcomer.
In Oulu, there are three inexperienced people in key positions.
Tappara can again be used as a point of comparison. The renovation was done there based on experience. Head coach of the Tampere team Rikard Grönborg has won three world championships and Olympic silver. There are also other medals.
Tappara’s sports manager Antti Tuomenoksa has successfully worked as a sports director in the SM league for almost 12 years.
Will the golden finger save?
There is a clear lack of leadership in Kärpi, but luckily for the people of Oulu, the golden finger that is familiar, has seen, experienced and done everything returned to the club’s service for this season.
Juha Junno. One of the best, if not the best sports boss in Finland.
Junno was the most significant factor in building the Kärppi dynasty. It is no coincidence that when Junno, who made a golden mark as CEO from 1996 to 2017, left, Kärppie’s decline began a couple of years after that.
Now he is the president of the club.
With its superior financial resources, Kärpi has the opportunity to rise to the top of the SM league.
How does Kärpät succeed in renewing itself like Tappara? That is Junno’s biggest challenge. He, if anyone, can meet the challenge.
Kärpät desperately needs a new arena, which Oulu has been dreaming about for years, even decades, in vain. But even if the arena does not materialize in the near future, the sporting renewal must still be implemented.
Who are the right people to reform Kärppie? Can a major club have such inexperienced players in key positions? The answers to them must be found under Junno’s leadership.
And one more question that I asked in the title: will the return of the golden finger save Kärpät?
The answer is: yes. But on what schedule, I can’t say.
Expert Topi Nättinen and reporter Jussi Paasi dish out the hottest topics in Finnish hockey once a week. Watch and listen to the latest episode of Paasi ja Nättinen: 5 minutas series in the video above.