HJK will face Klaksvik on Thursday in the decisive qualifying match of the Conference League.
HJK is in a situation where it has a lot of “season’s most important” matches. On Thursday, there will be another one like that when HJK meets Klaksvik from Färsaari in the decisive qualifying match of the Conference League.
The first leg on the away field ended 2–2, although HJK was able to play more than half of the match with superiority. Klaksvik hit the crossbar three times in the first half. In the second half, the home team barely rose from a 0–1 deficit to a 2–1 lead, until HJK’s Lee Erwin equalized in extra time. Erwin also scored in HJK’s 1–0 win.
The winner of the match pair advances to the renewed league stage of the Conference League. The losing team’s European games end.
Head coach of HJK Toni Korkeakunnas said after the first match that he was satisfied with the result, but not with the game performance. The thoughts were similar during the second match.
– We are one of the few teams that has gotten a result from that, but we need to improve our playing with the ball. The structure of the game must be the way we want it to be. We started there according to their chaos theory. The home field has been a good place for us, Korkeakunnas said.
HJK played in the group stage of the Conference League last season, in the group stage of the Europa League the previous season and in the group stage of the Conference League the previous season. Now the goal is that this pipe does not break.
However, a similar block phase is not known. In the conference league – and in other men’s Euro competitions – this season, a new system is used. We are no longer talking about the group stage, but the league stage. There are 36 teams. Six opponents are drawn for each team in the preliminary series.
The eight best teams in the league stage go directly to the top 16 playoffs. The teams ranked 9–24 in the league stage play a playoff match, the winners of which complete the top 16 groups.
At least from a Finnish point of view, they move in Europe big money. For entering the league stage of the conference league, the team receives 3.17 million euros. This is a slight increase from last season, when reaching the group stage earned 2.94 million. In the league stage, 400,000 euros are awarded for each win and 133,000 euros for a draw.
In addition to getting to the league stage, HJK’s second goal is the championship in the domestic league. KuPS is four points ahead, so there is really no room for losing points at all. Between Klaksvik matches, HJK beat Inter 1–0. On Sunday, an away match awaits in Vaasa as a guest of VPS.