Super competitive title race number two

Finland's Veikkausliiga had up until last week four sides that were vying for the title, in the end that was won for the first time by IFK Mariehamn after they got the win they needed against Ilves. However across the gulf in neighbouring Estonia, the title race is entering the final two rounds of games with one crucial result on Tuesday ensuring a dramatic finale is in store for these final rounds of games.

Tuesday saw Nõmme Kalju beat bottom side Rakvere Tarvas 2-1 with a winning goal from Italian Maximiliano Uggè in stoppage time. That goal moved Nõmme Kalju into second place, two points behind leaders Infonet with two rounds of games to play. They moved level on points with the big two Tallinn clubs Levadia and Flora on seventy-two. Four contenders for the title with two rounds left.

The league known as the Meistriliiga is contested by ten teams with all of them playing each other home and away twice. It commences in March every year and concludes in November. This season the four contenders have been in a league of their own. The league table shows this with the gap between 4th placed Levadia Tallinn and 5th placed Sillamäe Kalev standing at an enormous twenty-five points. 6th placed Paide are level with Sillamäe Kalev who themselves are nine points clear of the next side in the table, 8th placed Tammeka.

The Contenders:

To the four contenders themselves. Two of them are the country's most successful sides, Flora and Levadia Tallinn. Flora Tallinn have since independence in 1992, racked up ten league titles, their arch-rivals Levadia have nine. However you might be forgiven in thinking Levadia have been around since independence in the top flight but in actual fact, Levadia only played their first top flight season in 1999 having been founded the year before. Flora were the dominant team in the 90s and hold a joint record with Trans Narva in being the only founding members of the Meistriliiga in 1992 to never be relegated.

Nõmme Kalju are chasing only their second league title. Winners in 2012, they have emerged as a challenger to the Flora, Levadia arms race that developed in the 2000s. Promoted to the top flight for the first time in 2008 they have never finished below 5th in their current spell. During the summer they shocked Israeli side Maccabi Haifa in the Europa league qualifying rounds by beating them on penalties before bowing out to Osmanlıspor in the following round. They knocked out HJK Helsinki in their debut champions league campaign back in 2013 before Czech side Viktoria Plzeň ended their dreams.

The final contender are actually the current leaders, Infonet. They also hail from the capital Tallinn. However they are the only one of the contenders to never taste a league triumph. In fact they are the youngest club having been founded only in 2002. Infonet also only made their top flight bow in 2013 which makes their rise to this title challenge all the more impressive. Last season they ended up twenty-two points off the title, with two rounds left they are two clear.

The Run-in:

The season climaxes on November 5th but this coming Saturday (October 29th) will be a pivotal round. Flora Tallinn host Sillamäe Kalev with Levadia Tallinn away at bottom side Rakvere Tarvas. Nõmme Kalju are on the road to Tartu to face Tammeka with leaders Infonet playing the day before everyone at home to Paide, a chance to really put pressure on the chasing trio. 

Should all four remain in contention after this next round of games, the final day promises to be a very interesting watch. Similar to Finland's title race just ended, we have a pair of head-to-head fixtures for the title. Nõmme Kalju host leaders Infonet and Tallinn city rivals Levadia and Flora go at it in the derby. A mouthwatering climax to a pretty epic title race. 

Veikkausliiga update

Last month I did a blog post about the most competitive title race in Europe which turned out to be Finland's Veikkausliiga. At the time the top seven in the league were extremely close to each other with just seven points separating seventh place and top spot.

In the month since the contenders have been whittled down from seven to four. The race has ended for KuPS, who have lost every single game they have played in the past month and RoPS whose hopes ended by picking up just four points in that time. VPS are currently fifth and astoundingly still could, in theory at least, win the league. They sit five points off leaders IFK Mariehamn with two games to play. However realistically their hopes depend on an odd combinations of results. That leaves the four contenders being leaders IFK Mariehamn, traditional powerhouse HJK Helsinki, defending champions SJK and outsiders Ilves.

The league enters it's final two rounds of games after Friday's results. A day that saw none of the final four contenders win their games. Ilves were held to a 1-1 draw at home by lowly HIFK, SJK rescued a late point against mid-table Lahti while there was a top two clash with HJK Helsinki and IFK Mariehamn playing out a 1-1 draw at Sonera Stadium.

Those results mean IFK Mariehamn remain just about on course for a first ever league title. The side from Åland which lies just south of the gulf of Bothnia between Finland and Sweden are a solitary point ahead of HJK Helsinki. 
In third is defending champions SJK who are a point behind HJK. SJK also have a resurgent streak on their side and are actually the form team in Finland right now. In fourth a further point behind is Ilves. They are also reaching peak form at just the right time. 

The penultimate round of fixtures take place on Monday. IFK Mariehamn are away to Lahti, SJK host already relegated PK-35 Vantaa while Ilves host HJK in a massive clash between two contenders. Defeat for Ilves ends their hopes but a victory puts them above HJK and puts their title hopes in their own hands. 

This leads me onto the best part of this epic title race. The final day is next Sunday on October 23rd. In that round of games the fixture computer has given fans a pair of massive fixtures. All four contenders, should Ilves remain in the running until then, face another contender. HJK Helsinki host SJK while IFK Mariehamn are at home to Ilves. So it's pretty much set up for an almighty conclusion to what has been an utterly insane season. 

The run-in

The massive title swing that was October 8th

October 8th was a massive night in the League of Ireland title race. The scene that afternoon had Dundalk with a four point buffer ahead of Cork City with seven games to play, which includes a head-to-head between the two, more on that in a bit.

Dundalk also had the superior goal difference which was +40 with City on +34 large enough to effectively be an extra point in the title race.
Cork City were away on Saturday in Galway while Dundalk hosted a Sligo Rovers side that had their European ambitions still burning although getting quite feint so needed a result. Both games kicking off simultaneously at 7:45pm. Nobody including myself could've foreseen what was to unfold in those two hours on Saturday night.

It began when Sligo's French striker Achille Campion capitalized upon Gary Rogers fluffing a clearance to give his side the lead in the first minute. A minute later on the opposite coast Sean Maguire kept up his scoring run by putting City in front against a Galway side that sacked manager Tommy Dunne the previous week. Not even 7:50pm and already movement in the table. By 8:10pm the picture got rosier for City as goals from first Stephen Dooley and then Garry Buckley had City coasting at 3-0 while Dundalk were still 1-0 down but probing.
8:21pm and a massive moment in the title race. Philip Roberts, who had replaced the injured Campion minutes previously planted a low shot past Rogers after he evaded Andy Boyle and the Dundalk defense to put Sligo 2-0 up in Oriel park, Dundalk stunned. A moment of magic from the Sligo substitute. That is how it stayed until half-time. Forty five minutes of football, City moving to just a solitary point behind Dundalk in the table but crucially a five goal swing in goal difference. It was now Dundalk +38 and City +37.
To the second half and much like the first, no waiting around for the action. 8:48pm and Maguire got his second goal of the night to put City 4-0 up. Game set and match for City the only thing not certain was on the east coast at this point. That game was to have another turn on 8:54pm when Liam Martin was given his marching orders for Sligo. Not what Sligo needed and early enough in the half for Dundalk to still turn the deficit around. Just after 9pm and massive title swing number two as Rafael Cretaro finishes off a Sligo counter attack to put the visitors 3-0 up. Sensational stuff from the ten men of the Bit o'Red.
Dundalk failed to register even a consolation goal in the final half hour while for City there was still enough time for them to register a fifth when substitute Chidozie Ogbene slotted coolly past Sam Ramsbottom. A 5-0 victory for City coupled with a 3-0 defeat for Dundalk, a massive night in the title race. That eight goal swing in goal difference also wiping out the advantage Dundalk had and actually giving City the edge in that column.

The events of Saturday night set up a mouth watering head-to-head between the top two tonight. Dundalk with home advantage with a win will put daylight between them and their challengers with five to play after tonight.
City will go top with a victory and really put the pressure on their county Louth opponents.

There will be points dropped by both sides in the remaining games. The pair have after tonight five league games which will be squeezed in before the final day of the league season on October 28th. This means games every three-four days between now and then,
Dundalk have an extra game due to their Europa league exploits with them hosting Zenit St Petersburg in between league games with Longford and Bohemians. So ahead of tonight, Come on City!.

"Maybe the switch will do us good? "

In 2017 Georgia's top division, the Umaglesi Liga, will become the twelfth spring-to-autumn league in Europe. The decision taken earlier this year means that there will be a transitional season for the rest of this calendar year to decide who represents the country in next season's European competitions. The transitional campaign isn't a normal league campaign and does require a bit of a breakdown.

Transitional Format
The league has fourteen clubs which for this short season are divided into two groups of seven. Each side plays each other home and away against the sides in their own group. The two group winners will then play each other at the end in a championship play-off to decide who gets the champions league place. 2nd and 3rd place finishers in both groups enter play-offs against each other to decide who gets the Europa League berth. The winners of the Georgian cup will take a Europa League berth as usual.
The teams finishing bottom of both groups are relegated to the second tier Pirveli Liga with 5th and 6th place finishers in both groups entering play-offs to keep their top flight status, the two losers here are relegated.

The change:
The league originally started out as a spring-to-autumn season after independence. The Georgian Football Federation (GFF) then decided to go with the autumn-to-spring season from the 1991-92 season up until last season. In that time the league has switched around league formats with a sixteen team home and away format, a championship and relegation pool system after a general season and a ten team home and away format with a twenty team format and oddly a seventeen team format also used.
The reason for this switch in calendar can probably be put down to European performance. Georgian clubs enter European competition in early July which is a good month and a half before domestic football resumes. The hope is that by switching the calendar the clubs will be match fit and sharp heading into these games giving them a slight edge of potentially out of season opponents, thus improving European results.

Dinamo Tbilisi were outclassed by PAOK
source: enallaxnews.gr

This season only Dinamo Tbilisi made any sort of run in Europe. They beat Alashkert from Armenia in the champions league before defeat by Dinamo Zagreb sent them into the Europa League play-off round which ultimately ended in a 5-0 aggregate defeat to PAOK. For the past two seasons all other Georgian clubs haven fallen at the first hurdle.

There have been notable runs such as Chikura Sachkhere in 2014 when they reached the third qualifying round in the Europa League after beating Bursaspor from Turkey and of course Dila Gori's runs to the play-off round in successive seasons, beating sides such as AaB Aallborg, Hajduk Split and Anorthosis. Zestafoni have also reached the play-off round in recent years. However those runs remain exceptions as opposed to rule and as of yet Dinamo Tbilisi remain the only Georgian club to have qualified for a group stage of European competition (2004-05 UEFA Cup).

By getting Georgian teams match fit and in season when these qualifying games come around the GFF hope to replicate the success neighboring Azerbaijan is currently having. For the second season is succession, Azerbaijan have two sides competing in the Europa League group stage.
The case point for a change in calendar having better results is Ireland. In 2002 the league of Ireland made the decision to press ahead with a switch in calendar to play through the summer with the aim of improving European results. That switch was made it 2003 and only a year later Shelbourne made serious inroads of getting into the champions league group stage. Results in Europe did improve but only for a few years until the lack of money impacted on the standard of Irish sides. Results are only now starting to pick up after that lull with Shamrock Rovers in 2011 and Dundalk this season making the group stage of the Europa League.

The season so far:
So far this season it's a free for all. The biggest and most successful club, Dinamo Tbilisi are off the pace. The defending champions are six points off top spot in Group 2. The country's second most successful side, Torpedo Kutaisi are bottom of the same group.

The struggles of the bigger sides have opened a window of opportunity. Leading both groups are sides that have never won the league title before. Samtredia lead Group 1 by two points ahead Dinamo Batumi, who themselves haven't won the title before. Chikhura Sachkhere lead Group 2 by five points from Locomotivi Tbilisi.

The group games will be concluded on November 25th by which time the play-offs for the European places will take center stage so still a bit of time for the bigger sides to sort themselves out.