The Finnish MA eCup received a new champion last week!

SportsGamer and the Finnish Football Association hosted the Finnish MA eCup in two divisions over the course of the spring, and the Cup came to a close last Thursday, when LehPa was crowned the champions of the open division, and FF Jaro won the U16 division.

The best FIFA 22 players in Finland gathered on the premises of the Finnish Football Association last Thursday, on April 14th for the final event of the Finnish MA eCup 2022. The final event hosted the top two teams of the U16 division and the top 8 teams of the open division. There was certainly no lack of talent at the final event, featuring several players seen representing Finland at the national level before, such as Anton @Anzinho8 Korvenaho, Jesper @jjesu3 Hietarinne, Jesse @Kossu72 Kosamo and Erno @egoapina Parkkonen, who has led the national team in the FIFAe Nations Qualifiers over the past few months.

Thursday evening kicked off with the open division finals group stage, which was played in two groups of four teams. Two teams from each group would emerge into the eventual semifinals and those teams were HauPa, FC Kiffen, LehPa and SalPa with the pressure of the favorites resting heavily on the shoulders of FC Kiffen duo egoapina & Kossu72 and SalPa duo Anzinho & jjesu3. Before the open division semifinals, however, we saw some of the best young talent in the nation clash for the U16 championship, where FF Jaro's Robin @Soccernerd1 Forslund and Colin @colin_gaddnas123 Gäddnäs eventually managed to overcome KoiPS' duo Jere "ZerBa" Tiainen and Tommi @BasilikaJr Mönkkönen. Some of this young talent will definitely be seen on the bigger pitches in the future, so make sure to keep your eyes peeled for them!

In the open division, the semifinals were a shocker, as both favorites FC Kiffen and SalPa were knocked out with relative ease by the eventual finalists HauPa and LehPa. To our surprise, that meant that all of the players that had represented the Finnish national team this season were knocked out at this stage, and it was time for new talent to shine. On the HauPa side, we saw the very experienced Joona @Krompe Vaajala team up with Jeremias @jerkosz Kosamo, and they'd face the Hänninen brothers Markus @Masatial and Eelis "penaa_14" for the ultimate glory and spots with the national team in the near future. 

Eventually, the finals didn't end up being the thriller we all had on order due to the very skilled play of LehPa duo Masatial and pelaa_14. The Hänninen brothers employed a heavy defensive pressure throughout and were lethal on their scoring chances, ultimately not even giving their opposition a chance to come close. At the end, it seemed like their brotherly chemistry and the experience of Masatial was enough to secure them the victory, and their record for the final weekend ended up being six wins, a draw and a loss, which was enough to hoist the Finnish MA eCup 2022.

"It feels really good. We really didn't have any expectations for the finals other than we'd play and see where that takes us, if it's a win, then good, if it's a loss we move on. We've got about 20 2v2 games under our belts and when we got on the train from Joensuu this morning our main objective was to move on from the group stage", the younger brother Eelis summarizes.

"As I said to Eelis during the games, no matter the score, the mentality should always be 0-0. I'm very proud of my brother, we've played together in the same house and always had some banter about when we'll hoist the cup. Well, now we will!", older brother Matias praises.

It'll remain to be seen when the brothers dress up for the national team for the first time, and if they'll be back to defend their title with LehPa next year. For now, stay tuned for more FIFA 22 content coming your way on SportsGamer in the future.