I'm getting all excited and stuff

Murray also said that he expects to talk to Teemu Selanne again next week to gauge whether he wants to play one more season but that re-signing Saku Koivu might be the higher priority.

"I think Saku is a little more important before the first to get a feel on what he's going to do," Murray said. "We've talked. I met (Koivu's agent) Don Baizley yesterday morning. We'll see how this week goes."

Link

Dear Koivu, SIGN WITH DUCKS! Please?

Dear Selänne, ONE MORE YEAR! Pretty please.

I'm fashionably late for this party

So... There was this draft thingy held in Los Angeles during the weekend? That's nice and all but we had this midsummer fest so I was a) not caring about anything that didn't involve me getting food/wine and b) kinda busy at laughing at my drowning countrymen.

But anyways, here's my thoughts of this event.

• My favourite, Mikael Granlund, was drafted 9th overall (good achievement for a Finn) by Minnesota Wild. I kinda like the Wild so this is pretty OK. But. If they manage to lure him to North America for next season, I'm gonna flip. He needs to first win the Finnish league with HIFK. And I truly hope he doesn't turn out to be like every other Finnish top junior (Selänne excluded) and never live up to his potential and/or being injured all the time.
  
• There were only 5 European player drafted in the 1st round which is not good. 3 Russians, 1 Czech, 1 Finn and 0 (!!!!) Swede does not bode well for European countries if this trend continues in the future drafts. The need to rebuild Finland's junior work has been known for years but little has been done (right) to make it better. Sweden on the other hand made some serious improvements (as last year's draft proved) so this year's minor success (first one was drafted at 35th overall) is somewhat surprising. Though, they had pretty nice things going on in the second round so they will still stay way ahead of Finland...
  
• The size might be losing its meaning as 6 of the firts rounders were under 6'0. Of course, since I'm arrogant European this doesn't tell me anything but I assume it's concidered as kinda small for hockey player...
• How the hell I'm supposed to pronounce "Pysyk"?
• 8 Europeans were drafted in the 2nd round. 6 of them were Swedes and Calle Järnkrok makes my top 10 funniest name list. Be proud kid, be proud. But continuing with Sweden, despite the disappointing 1st round, they had pretty large manning in the latter rounds to continue the blue gold occupation of NHL.
  
• All around good boy and poster boy candidate Kiril Kabanov was - to my deep and neverending sadness - drafted by Islanders in the 3rd round.
• Presumably in a hope of getting young version of Vikingstad or Zuccarello Aasen Toronto decided to use their other 3rd round pic to draft a Norwegian. Called Sondre Olden.
  
• Done with laughing? Good. So by drafting mostly Russians Capitals are apparently trying turn themselves into NHL's Little Russia. Which is of course a brilliant idea because having a team full of Russian has worked so well for Russia. Wait... Unfortunately for their pursuit to defense free hockey, Thrashers seem to have discovered this option too and took their part of Motherland's gifts as well.
  
• The next drafted Finn after Granlund was Jonas Donskoi (Florida Patnthers), who was one of the 4 Finns drafted in the 4th round. Two of them by a team I dislike. Boo!
• Ouellette? Seriously, WTF is wrong with these names?
  

Yes I'd rather hurt than feel nothing at all

I guess. I can't think any other reason than love for pain why I still watch sports even though I know it will do nothing but break my heart...

Anyways, with the sadness caused by Italy's premature exit from the World Cup, I now present my theme song for Finland to the hockey season 2010-2011.
Because it will suck.
It always does. Sigh.

I… can’t get out of bed today
Or get you off my mind
I just can’t seem to find a way
To leave the sport behind

I ain’t tripping
I’m just wishing
You know what it takes
You know what it means

You’ve kept me hanging from a string
While you make me cry
I’ve tried to believe in you
But you just give me lies

I ain’t tripping
I’m just wishing
You know what it takes
You know what it means

Every now and then when I’m all alone
I’d be wishing that you would win a game or two
Say you want the trophy back but you never do
I feel like such a fool
There’s nothing I can do
I’m such a fool for you

I can’t take it
What am I waiting for?
I’m still breaking
I wish the gold even more
And I can’t fake it
The way I could before
I hate you but I love you
I can’t stop cheering for you
It’s true, I’m stuck on you

Now hockey's a broken record that’s been
Skipping in my head
I keep singing yesterday
Why you have to play the game that way

I ain’t tripping
I’m just wishing
You know what it takes
You know what it means

Every now and then when I’m all alone
I’d be wishing that you would win a game or two
Say you want the trophy back but you never do
I feel like such a fool

I can’t take it
What am I waiting for?
I’m still breaking
I wish the gold even more
And I can’t fake it
The way I could before
I hate you but I love you
I can’t stop cheering for you
It’s true, I’m stuck on you

Most of lyrics borrowed from this lovely song.

Grrrr.... Diego not happy

Or, "Grrr.... Diego's coming to you". Which ever works better for you...


My favourite news paper, Helsingin Sanomat had a nice article about Maradona's behavior when he follows Argentina's play. Unlike some stone face couches that barely show any emotion no matter what their team does, Diego is jumping, yelling, cheering on, dancing, hugging, kissing, crawling etc. depending on the action on the field.

Ay ay... something didn't went right...

Boys boys boys...

Italy 1 - New Zealand 1

Blargh

Go kiwis?

Of course, no one outside of Italy and New Zealand will never remember this since everyone is focused on laughing at France. Unless you're French in which case I assume you'd be crying. Je suis très désolé.

Happened previously on Desperate Housewives Footballers:

• Nicolas Anelka didn't appreciate coach Domenech telling him what to do better on the second half and more or less told him to fuck off. This then lead to situation where Anelka was the one who needed to get fuck off.
• At the beginning of the practice today captain Evra and fitness coach Raymond Duverne had a "minor" arguement that nearly lead to a fight. After this the players refused to train as a support to Anelka and walked back to their bus.

Coming after commercial break:

• With serious frustration to his team, ZZ will make cameo role in 2010 World Cup and headbutt Bakari Sagne for his hair style that is humiliation for whole France and it's reputation as fashion Mecca.
• Nicolas Anelka will land to CDG. Intrestingly this will be the last time anyone sees him.
  
• As a result of France's poor play people in Paris are starting to riot. In related news, Quebec Airlines broke its record for sold flights from Montréal to Paris.
  

Seriously though, this is just pathetic and sad. France is a football country and I assume this is a national catastrophe there. Monsieur Sarkozy n'est pas content...

All the crazy shit I did tonight
Those will be the best memories.
I just wanna let it go for the night
That would be the best therapy for me.

Right boys?

Killing me...

Ak Bars Kazan will apparently play in Finland in September.

Now, normally this would be great news but they will go to Jyväskylä and play against local team JYP instead of visiting my pretty city and playing HIFK/Jokerit. So this is not a dream... THIS IS A FUCKING NIGHTMARE!

Ahem.

(And no, I do not think I'm overreacting)

One more year!

Please?

At least there's still hope because Selänne has started practicing "just in case". In recent interview he stated that if the Ducks will keep somewhat same team and will fight for the Cup, he might play one more season. But if they go for youth and rebuilding, it's over.



And now special message from everyone's favourite footballer.

I truly hate his occasional diving but god he can be so good...

Also, señors Fabio Coentrao and Raul Meireles can come to blow me heart everytime they want...


Mmmm... I think I like Portugal. I think I really do....

"No sex, we're British"

And that ladies and gentlemen is a real (translated) headline of a Finnish article about the Three Lions. I'm just wondering how there's still so many people on that island if they have no sex? That though would explain why Mr. Green felt the need to let some slacker to score on him.

/Facepalm

Surprisingly there has happened some other things than England's failure thisfar too.

Group A

South Africa 1 - Mexico 1
Uruguay 0 - France 0

Group B

Argentina 1 - Nigeria 0
Korea Republic 2 - Greece 0

Group C

England 1 - USA 1
Algeria 0 - Slovenia 1

Group D

Serbia 0 - Ghana 1
Germany 4 - Australia 0 (after 80 minutes, went to bed after that)

Group E

First games on Monday:

Netherlands - Denmark
Japan - Cameroon

Group F

First game on Monday:

Italy - Paraguay

Group H

First games on Tuesday:

Côte d'Ivoire - Portugal
Brazil - Korea DPR

And now, back to my favourite hate/loathe/love affair

From zamboni driver to SC winner

So, my morning was ruined by a radio station that a) barely has news and b) pretty much never has sport news but which decided today announce that Niemi has become the first Finnish goalie to win the Stanley Cup. This totally destroyed my efforts to avoid news about the finals I didn't care about. Well, I would've had if the damn meteor had shown up.

Anyways, as little as I care about Hawks winning the Cup - or Flyers losing it for that matter - Niemi's achievement is the highlight of the year for Finnish sport. Seriously, that's the best thing happened thisfar. Which is kinda sad but hey, I'll take what I get so let's get the party started! Waka waka...

I just hope this doesn't mean that Hossa will abandon his cute little Stanley cap.

Watch out suckers, new and fancy European hockey league is coming!

Maybe. Who knows, I think there has been talk about this league in some level for my whole life. And I'm old. Like really, really old. Sniff.

Anyways, here's what the Swedish master minds have come up with for the new, shiny superleague:

- 40 teams in 4 division
• 10 teams from Sweden in Swedish division
• 10 from teams Finland in Finnish division
• 10 from teams Germany, Austrian and Switzerland combined in German division
• 10 from teams Slovakia and Czech combined in East-European division

So Swedish and Finnish teams get their own divisions but the others have to share with neighbours? Selfish....

- Each team will play 60% of its games against division rivals, 20% against closest division (Sweden - Finland, German speaking area - East-Europe) and rest 20% of games against the two other divisions.

Stranger danger.... It's so much more fun when you play by yourself! Wait... Btw, I assume this is just Swedes evil plan to get kick Finns' ass all year long instead of settling for the Worlds.

- In the end, the division winners and two teams from KHL - who apparently will just crash the party at this point - will play sort of playoffs (give me better translation for "slutspel" in English that makes sense!). Apparently they will play each others - like at Wolrds and Olympics - and 4 highest placed team will go to semifinals and final. The winner of this European league would then face the Stanley Cup winner.

This sounds kinda cool and stuff - I really like the idea of the European league - but how on earth they think NHL would agree on with that final? I mean, for them the Stanley Cup is the one and only season final, why screw it by playing after it?
And what's the point even if NHL would agree to play? The schedule for this league is to begin in 2012 and there's no way European teams could lure that many players back home in two years to get a team that could possibly challenge SC winner if that said winner have any kind of motivation left after long season and winning the Cup they appreciate the most. I believe Canadians and Americans couldn't care less about this "World final".
The way I see it is that it would be smarter to first build the image for the league with just European teams and if it gets major status over the world, then try to "expand" to North America.


Of course, none of this will matter because in 2015 Europe will look like and we all play football.