HPK’s new head coach Mikko on the mainland has a positive feeling about the team after the first practices. He states that there was a strong will to fight and effort on the ice.
– Above all, a suitable common spirit and drive must start from within the team, which will start to find the winning chemistry.
The team announced on Monday evening that the head coach Matias “Maso” Lehtonen and coach Mikko Sirento-Manninen are allowed to leave.
Mikko Manner states that when a coach takes the helm in the middle of the season, you have to look only forward. He wants to find things that could help the team get more energy and increased self-confidence.
– So that the wins start coming, and the feeling of shame and fear doesn’t hit the players’ shirts when they jump onto the field.
For the team, this means taking a certain kind of responsibility.
– One or two men have had to pay the price for a bad start to the season. Surely this also increases the responsibility of individual players and the entire team in the locker room, says Manner.
He is very competitive. My wish is to bring joy to the team.
– I hope the players feel cared for and have such courage that they dare to give back on the playing field, and there is no need to think in advance what the coach will think if they make a mistake. I hope that there will be successes and wins.
Mikko Manner sets out to improve the slightly lost self-confidence of the players and the team through simple things.
– The famous pointless thinking out of the game, so that the players could boldly complete without thinking pointlessly. Maybe even a certain over-trying, freshness, skating and fighting, that kind of simple hockey to begin with.
Changing the coach did not surprise the expert
Urheilu’s ice hockey expert Top Nättinen was not surprised to hear about HPK’s decision. Few sports clubs have other ways to react and wake up the crowd during the season than changing the head coach.
Nättinen was a little surprised that the change was made just now, after five matches.
– On the other hand, I have always been on the side that if the head coach ends up being changed, it should be done early rather than late.
Listen to Topi Nättinen’s interview here:
Even before the start of the league season, HPK’s material was said to be the weakest in the league. Despite this, the club management seems to have expected a better result from Matias Lehtones.
CEO of HPK Kaj Källarsson also reminds that the team was recently strengthened somewhat.
– The result ultimately decides when we have succeeded and when we have not. This is the brutal side of the sport.
Will the way of playing change, will the losing cycle be broken?
The team is now under the new head coach Mikko Manner and his assistant coach Olli Hällforsin under the heel of. He will also continue in the team Ari-Pekka Selin.
CEO Källarsson trusts that the pace will change.
– Mikko Manner is a very experienced and meritorious coach. We believe that he will be able to turn our game-like course around with his input, says CEO Källarsson.
Topi Nättinen would have missed the usual game advantage with a change of coach, but Mikko Manner is not known as a game style coach.
– He is more of an energy booster, but Maso was quite good at that too. Now let’s sort of bring the t-shirt behind the bench. It simply won’t be enough because that lineup is so limited.
“Let’s drag the morning exercises like a lame duck”
According to Topi Nättinen, the change of coach was a disaster in terms of communication. HPK informed about it in the evening. In an interview with MTV on the morning of the same day, CEO Kaj Källarsson and then head coach Matias Lehtonen commented that there is trust and we will continue together.
Nättinen thinks that the club’s management knew about the change of coach at the time.
– It’s a different matter whether the decision about the firings had already been made that morning, but you can’t speak publicly and lie that there is trust. So, in that sense, it really went down the drain.
In Nättinen’s opinion, the timing was cowardly. Should have come out with the thing in time during the day.
– The coach is allowed to run the morning exercises like a lame duck and make such comments. In a way, it’s even humiliating.
HPK CEO Kaj Källarsson states that decisions about the coach were only made in the evening at a fast pace. The contract with Mikko Manner was written late in the evening.
HPK’s situation is bad
Urheilu’s expert Topi Nättinen does not believe that the club has much room left to react in the player market. Especially now, when two head coaches are being paid. In addition, the salary of the fired assistant coach Mikko Sirento-Manninen will run.
– In my opinion, this is an unworkable place, anyone can be behind the bench there, sums up Nättinen.
Regarding the acquisition of new players, HPK CEO Kaj Källarsson states that the situation is alive.
– If the situation requires it, the club strives to be able to react to the situation.