2009 Veikkausliiga

The 2009 Veikkausliiga was the 79th season of top-tier football in Finland. It began on 18 April 2009 and ended on 17 October 2009. Inter Turku were the defending champions.

Veikkausliiga

Season	2009
Champions	HJK 22nd league title
Relegated	RoPS
Champions League	HJK
Europa League	Honka TPS Inter Turku (via dom. cup)
Matches played	182
Goals scored	498 (2.74 per match)
Top goalscorer	Hermanni Vuorinen (16)
Biggest home win	Honka 9-0 RoPS
Biggest away win	RoPS 1-5 TamU KuPS 0-4 Honka RoPS 0-4 TPS
Highest scoring	Honka 9-0 RoPS
← 2008 2010 →

The championship was won by HJK Helsinki, who came out on top of a three-team race which also involved Honka Espoo and TPS Turku. On the bottom end of the table, RoPS were relegated to the Ykkönen while JJK will have to compete in a two-legged relegation play-off.

Promotion and relegation

KooTeePee finished at the bottom of the 2008 season and were relegated to Ykkönen. Their place was taken by Ykkönen champions JJK. 13th placed Veikkausliiga team KuPS and Ykkönen runners-up competed in a two-legged relegation play-offs for one spot in 2009 Veikkausliiga. KuPS won 2–1 on aggregate and thereby retained their league position.

Overview

MYPA

Honka

HJK

Jaro

JJK

KuPS

Lahti

Mariehamn

RoPS

Tampere United

Inter
TPS

VPS

Haka

Location of teams in Veikkausliiga 2009

Club	Location	Stadium	Capacity	Manager
FC Haka	Valkeakoski	Tehtaan kenttä	3,516	Olli Huttunen
HJK	Helsinki	Finnair Stadium	10,770	Antti Muurinen
FC Honka	Espoo	Tapiolan Urheilupuisto	6,000	Mika Lehkosuo
FC Inter	Turku	Veritas Stadion	9,372	Job Dragtsma
FF Jaro	Jakobstad	Jakobstads Centralplan	5,000	Mika Laurikainen
JJK	Jyväskylä	Harjun stadion	3,000	Ville Priha
KuPS	Kuopio	Magnum Areena	3,500	Kai Nyyssönen
FC Lahti	Lahti	Lahden Stadion	14,465	Ilkka Mäkelä
IFK Mariehamn	Mariehamn	Wiklöf Holding Arena	1,600	Pekka Lyyski
MYPA	Myllykoski, Kouvola	Saviniemi	4,167	Janne Lindberg
RoPS	Rovaniemi	Keskuskenttä	3,400	Mika Lumijärvi
Tampere United	Tampere	Ratina Stadion	17,000	Ari Hjelm
TPS	Turku	Veritas Stadion	9,372	Pasi Rautiainen
VPS	Vaasa	Hietalahti Stadium	4,600	Petri Vuorinen

Managerial changes

Team	Outgoing manager	Manner of departure	Date of vacancy	Replaced by	Date of appointment	Position in table
VPS	Tomi Kärkkäinen	Resigned	15 May 2009 [1]	Petri Vuorinen	15 May 2009 [1]	14th
RoPS	Valeri Bondarenko	Sacked	27 May 2009 [2]	Mika Lumijärvi Zeddy Saileti	27 May 2009 [2]	14th
FF Jaro	Mika Laurikainen	Sacked	18 August 2009	Alexei Eremenko Sr.	18 August 2009
Haka	Olli Huttunen	Sacked	7 September 2009	Sami Ristilä	7 September 2009	5th
RoPS	Mika Lumijärvi	Sacked	7 October 2009	Zeddy Saileti Jorma Turpeenniemi	7 October 2009	14th

League table

Pos	Team	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification or relegation
1	HJK (C)	26	14	10	2	45	21	+24	52	Qualification to Champions League second qualifying round
2	FC Honka	26	13	10	3	65	29	+36	49	Qualification to Europa League second qualifying round
3	TPS	26	13	10	3	46	20	+26	49	Qualification to Europa League first qualifying round
4	IFK Mariehamn	26	10	13	3	30	21	+9	43
5	FC Inter	26	11	7	8	38	30	+8	40	Qualification to Europa League third qualifying round[a]
6	Haka	26	10	7	9	40	35	+5	37
7	Tampere United	26	11	4	11	31	31	0	37
8	VPS	26	10	5	11	30	36	−6	35
9	MYPA	26	9	7	10	32	30	+2	34	Qualification to Europa League first qualifying round[b]
10	FF Jaro	26	8	8	10	33	34	−1	32
11	FC Lahti	26	8	7	11	33	40	−7	31
12	KuPS	26	6	5	15	29	53	−24	23
13	JJK (O)	26	3	7	16	25	52	−27	16	Qualification to relegation play-offs
14	RoPS (R)	26	4	4	18	21	66	−45	16	Relegation to Ykkönen

Source: veikkausliiga.com (in Finnish)
Rules for classification: 1) points; 2) goal difference; 3) number of goals scored.
(C) Champions; (O) Play-off winners; (R) Relegated
Notes:

1. Inter Turku qualified for the third qualifying round of the UEFA Europa League by winning the 2009 Finnish Cup.
2. Finland was among the best three associations in the UEFA Fair Play ranking and thus received an additional spot in the first qualifying round of the Europa League.^[3]

Relegation play-offs

JJK as 13th placed team of 2009 Veikkausliiga and KPV as runners-up of the 2009 Ykkönen competed in a two-legged play-offs for one spot in the 2010 Veikkausliiga. JJK won the play-offs by 5–3 and remained in Veikkausliiga.

21 October 2009

15:30 EEST

KPV	2 – 3	JJK
Itälä 24' Linjala 61'		Kari 40' Lahtinen 49' Nam 69'

Kokkolan Keskuskenttä, Kokkola

---

25 October 2009

14:00 EET

JJK	2 – 1	KPV
Lahtinen 61' Nam 68'		Kalliokoski 87'

Harjun stadion, Jyväskylä

Results

Home \ Away	HAK	HJK	HON	INT	JAR	JJK	KPS	LAH	MAR	MYP	RPS	TAM	TPS	VPS
Haka		1–2	1–1	2–2	0–0	2–4	3–0	3–0	5–1	2–3	3–1	1–0	0–3	0–1
HJK	3–3		1–1	2–0	1–1	1–1	5–1	1–0	2–0	1–0	4–0	1–0	2–2	2–0
FC Honka	2–0	1–1		2–3	5–1	5–2	4–1	2–2	1–1	0–0	9–0	3–1	0–0	3–0
FC Inter	0–2	1–1	2–1		1–0	3–0	2–3	1–1	1–1	2–1	4–0	2–2	2–0	0–1
FF Jaro	1–0	0–2	3–5	0–1		5–1	1–1	0–1	0–0	3–0	2–0	0–0	1–0	1–3
JJK	0–0	1–1	2–3	1–0	0–2		1–2	2–1	0–2	0–1	1–1	2–2	1–1	1–2
KuPS	5–1	0–3	0–4	0–2	2–2	2–0		1–1	2–2	0–2	3–0	1–2	0–3	3–3
FC Lahti	2–4	1–2	1–1	1–3	2–1	3–1	1–0		1–1	0–1	4–1	2–1	2–4	0–0
IFK Mariehamn	2–1	0–0	2–2	2–0	2–1	3–1	3–0	2–0		0–0	2–1	1–0	1–1	0–0
MYPA	0–2	1–0	1–3	0–0	0–0	4–0	1–2	2–2	1–2		4–0	4–1	2–2	0–2
RoPS	0–0	1–0	1–2	0–2	5–3	2–1	1–0	0–1	0–0	1–1		1–5	0–4	2–3
Tampere United	1–1	1–2	1–0	3–2	0–2	1–0	2–0	0–2	1–0	2–0	3–1		0–2	1–0
TPS	1–2	1–1	0–0	2–0	1–1	0–0	3–0	5–2	0–0	3–1	3–2	1–0		2–0
VPS	0–1	3–4	2–5	2–2	1–2	3–2	1–0	1–0	0–0	0–2	2–0	0–1	0–2

Source: veikkausliiga.com (in Finnish)
Legend: Blue = home team win; Yellow = draw; Red = away team win.

Statistics

Top goalscorers Source: veikkausliiga.com (in Finnish) Rank Player Club Goals 1 Hermanni Vuorinen Honka 16 2 Jami Puustinen Honka 12 3 Timo Furuholm Inter Turku 11 4 Wayne Brown TPS 9 Mikko Paatelainen TPS 9 Babatunde Wusu TPS 9 8 Tamas Gruborovics IFK Mariehamn 8 Juho Mäkelä HJK 8 Drilon Shala Lahti 8 Dawda Bah HJK 8 Maxim Votinov MYPA 8 Nam Ik-Kyung JJK 8

Top assistants Source: veikkausliiga.com (in Finnish) Rank Player Club Assists 1 Sebastian Sorsa HJK 11 2 Nicholas Otaru Honka 9 3 Wayne Brown TPS 8 Sebastian Strandvall Haka 8 Mikko Innanen Haka 8 6 Dawda Bah HJK 7 Mika Ojala Inter Turku 7 Babatunde Wusu TPS 7 9 Mikko Hyyrynen Jaro 6 Mikko Manninen TPS 6 Severi Paajanen Inter Turku 6 Demba Savage Honka 6

Monthly awards

Month	Coach of the Month	Player of the Month
April[4]	Pekka Lyyski (IFK Mariehamn)	Hermanni Vuorinen (Honka)
May[5]	Olli Huttunen (Haka)	Sebastian Strandvall (Haka)
June[6]	Mika Laurikainen (Jaro)	Jens Nygård (VPS)
July[7]	Pasi Rautiainen (TPS)	Jukka Lehtovaara (TPS)