Friday’s SM league matches will be watched on Puhe’s Ice Hockey Tour starting at 6:05 p.m. Listen to the live broadcast here.
The ice hockey championship league is in quite a state of ferment. The wild price of the league share, which was eventually reported to be 3.67 million euros, caused the Jokers to back off their plans to raise quickly.
According to Urheilu’s information, even Kiekko-Espoo, which has already submitted its own license application, is not likely to accept the current conditions that have been in public discussion as they are.
According to insider sources, a full rebellion is underway. The big clubs have long been upset about the policies of the League’s management. Now even medium-sized clubs are joining the criticism. In addition to the criticism of the league, according to ‘s sources, the rift between a few clubs has also intensified.
The roar has been loud, but one significant voice has shined through its long absence.
Where are the players? The most important people in the whole game. Performers without which no game is played. Artists that audiences pay to see.
On Thursday, the players finally broke their public silence. The Players’ Association (SJRY) published a press release in which players were required to participate in decision-making together with the SM league and the Ice Hockey League.
At the end of the press release, the public’s suspicion that the current system is possibly in violation of the Competition Act was raised. There has even been talk of a cartel. The Players’ Association wants two vibrant professional leagues in Finland, whose systems do not raise doubts about the legality of the operation.
“If this cannot be achieved through cooperation, the Players’ Association will have to take legal action,” the announcement says.
Did the cache of the bosses get wiped?
At this point, I’ll make a little imagination game. I imagine for a moment that I am the president of the SM league Heikki Hiltunen.
On Thursday afternoon, an announcement from SJRY arrives in my email. I stop to look at the last sentence of the announcement. I’m laughing out loud, because the players now have no chance to influence this matter!
“For legal action”, hahhaha! Why would they sue us now? Not at all! Why did I interrupt my lunch because of this?
My fantasy play ends here.
I tried something like that, because it seems that the SC league office has been lulled into the fact that the players can’t influence anything at all. It wouldn’t be a big surprise though.
– Lapas, soft, indifferent, have not taken the sides of the workers. The worst professional association that can be found in Finland, expert Ismo Lehkonen rumbled in the Ice Hockey round.
Do Hiltunen and his partners think about the players’ association in the same way as Lehkonen?
If you think about it, the local memory looks like the disk bosses have been wiped. When the players have shown their wishes, the SM league has had to back down.
Two years ago, the players’ association sent a letter of demand to the SM league after a long-lasting struggle. At that time, the subject of the dispute was the fact that there was no valid general agreement between the parties, but the League continued to use, among other things, the players’ photos and identification information.
The Finnish Competition and Consumer Authority (KKV) had already made a decision on the matter, in favor of the players, but the SM league continued the delay fight. In the end, the dispute ended in a victory for the players – and became expensive for the League. According to Urheilu’s information, the new general agreement became a direct lottery win for the players’ association compared to the old agreement.
The players also contacted the same agency in 2017. KKV concluded that the League acted in violation of the Competition Act. It was an agreement between the SM league clubs and the SM league, according to which players who played in the same season in the KHL in the Joker’s shirt could not be hired in the main league under the threat of a fine. KKV ordered the procedure in question to be terminated.
In both cases, the league fought a desperate delay, but lost. Does anything else sound fresh and familiar to your ears?
Will the SM league continue to push back this time as well, even though almost all signs point to a wall coming up soon? Do Hiltunen and his partners imagine that the mention of legal actions in the players’ association’s announcement is just lip service or a shot in the dark?
Is the League’s operation against the Competition Act?
What are the legal actions that the players’ association says they will resort to as a last resort, then really based on?
They are largely based on the facts, some of which have already been brought up in the public debate.
There are two key questions. Is the League’s operation against the Competition Act? Is Liiga guilty of abusing a dominant market position? The players’ association intends to resolve these issues through the courts, if there is no other option.
According to the experts interviewed by Urheilu, the current conditions, for example regarding the league share, can be seen as an abuse of a dominant market position.
According to the experts, operating in accordance with the Competition Act would require the League to set reasonable, transparent, non-discriminatory, clear and written license conditions, which could be achieved by filling a sports league position and providing hockey-related services in the SM League.
If the above-mentioned conditions are not fulfilled, according to the experts’ view, it is even a cartel that violates the Competition Act.
There is also a precedent, from 1994. The limited company that ran the basketball club Joensuun Kataja made an investigation request to the Finnish Competition Authority (predecessor of the Finnish Competition and Consumer Agency) about a closed series, which it saw as illegal. The Finnish Competition Authority stated in its decision that a closed series is fundamentally against the competition law in Finland.
The Finnish Competition Authority did not take any further measures, as the Basketball Association decided to change its series system.
The SM league has emphasized many times that the series has not been closed, but that it was possible to get there by fulfilling the license conditions. The problem just seems to have become that the Liiga’s vague license conditions, combined with the shockingly expensive league stock, do not meet the obligations of reasonableness and equality.
Oh yes, one question seemed to be forgotten: where is the Ice Hockey Federation lurking? No one has released a single word from there, although now the future of the league under it, Mestis, is also at stake.
Apparently no one is interested there. Unfortunately, it’s not surprising. But that’s another story.