Kosonen: Finland´s next one

Eero Kosonen is Finland’s latest big name on the list of Top goalies. The 193 cm tall ballstopper took his time making it to a big name in Finland but now he is the country’s number one who will next try to make an impression playing for Swedish Växjö.

The finest moment of Eero Kosonen’s floorball career this far happened on 20th April 2014. A sold-out Jyväskylä Ice Arena exploded with the final buzzer with Happee winning their first Finnish title. Classic had just been beaten 4-3 and after 23 Salibandyliiga season’s Happee was finally number one. ”Getting to clinch it at the packed Jyväskylä Arena topped it all”, Eero Kosonen now looks back.

Kosonen’s success has gone hand in hand with the one of Happee. The notoriously mediocre team made the headlines in 2011/2012 when they rose from regular season 7th place to the semi-finals after unexpectedly beating Classic. With Happee becoming a regular in the semis from theat moment on, it became obvious they also had a hot goalie. For a team living off their flashy but often undisciplined offense, solid goaltending was absolutely crucial. With their youth who had dominated Finland’s junior series’ for years becoming the players of the A-team, Happee´s faith has changed. Winning the regular season but finishing disappointedly 4th in 2013, celebrating their first title in 2014 and getting beaten in the finals by SPV in 2015, Happee and Eero Kosonen were now indisputably top operators.

_{Eero Kosonen debuted in the National team in 2011.}

Never a member of a U19 national team
It is notable, though, that Eero Kosonen’s road to the top had been by no means straightforward. His success was preceded by six Salibandyliiga seasons - first playing for his native NST Lappeenranta better known for its terrier-like fighting spirit than wins and ”the old Happee” fighting against relegation. The same applies for Eero Kosonen’s international career. Having never been selected for the juniors’ national team, the now 28-year old only caught Petri Kettunen’s eye in 2011 and has played 34 men’s internationals since. ”My both WFC tournaments in 2012 and 2014 have been memorable experiences but with only finishing second both times, I cannot call them top moments of my career”, Kosonen points out. In 2012 he was still clearly number two behind Henri Toivoniemi but was changed in in the second period of the final in the middle of a serious trashing by Sweden. In Gothenburg in 2014, though, he was the man to play both games against Sweden and reducing the hosts to a tight 3-2 win in the final.

Still the same job, just in Sweden...
For Finland’s number one goalie, a contract offer from Sweden was no surprise. During the summer it was revealed Eero Kosonen would follow names like Henri Toivoniemi, Pekka Nieminen, Toni Lötjönen or Henri Korhola as the next Finnish keeper to try to make it in the sport’s biggest league. Växjö even described him as the biggest signing in the club history. ”I had seven fine years with Happee but I felt it was now time to try out new challenges. It has always been my goal to some day play in Svenska Superligan and from the start of talks with Växjö it became obvious that the right time was now if just things outside the rink would be arranged. I only heard good things about the club and after having lived up here for a week with my fiancée, the good impression has just gotten better”, Eero Kosonen praises. It’s going to be a whole new floorball world in Sweden but the Finn is prepared. ”Different style of play, new players, teams and arenas but my job will still be the same: to stop the ball.”

Finnish baseball as a basis
Like so many Finnish athletes-to-be, young Eero Kosonen spent his afternoons and evenings playing ball. ”We used to play ball out on the backyard until it got too dark and the next day right after school the game started again.” Like all Finnish boys, Kosonen played organized ice hockey and football but in Lappeenranta where, as top floorball coach Jarkko Rantala puts it, ” we grow stronger near the Russian border”, also pesäpallo, the Finnish version of baseball. Eero Kosonen’s big brother Topi is one of the country’s top pesäpallo players and the game is really big in the country, drawing attendances of thousands. Professional players’  average salaries are even higher than in Finnish football. The connection to growing good floorball goalies just might be there as Jonna Mäkelä, too, is known as an elite pesäpallo player. For Eero Kosonen, the hollow ball was always there but serious floorball playing for the local club started when he was 12. At 18, he had made his choice of sport and the result proved, that its was a lucky one for floorball. 

_{Eero Kosonen is ready for his swedish mission (Photo Mika Hilska)}

Once a goalie, always a goalie
”In hockey, I was playing in goal and it was an obvious choice in floorball, too. There’s just something fascinating in it.” Having won NST junior medals, Eero Kosonen soon took his place in the club’s Salibandyliiga team first along Ossi Lahti and then as number one. After three NST seasons, studies took Kosonen to Happee where he game by game grew into one of the country’s finest. Good goalie coaches have been a big part of Eero Kosonen’s development. ”I have been lucky enough to get specific coaching both in NST and Happee and it absolutely should be available in every club. It’s hard to tell what it should be like in general as for me the coaching has been tailored around my needs and qualities. It should support the goalie’s strengths without forgetting to work on his weaknesses.” The requirements for a good floorball goalie are obvious. ”Playing on your knees make your middle body and the part lower from there to have to be in top shape. And your head, too, as goalies are the ones whose mistakes always show up immediatelly on the scoreboard. Goalies are individual athletes within teams but I wouldn’t say there’s a particular type of personality represented between the posts. We come in many kinds of persons just as everyone else.”

Dreaming about the WFC title
Compared with his predecessors on Finnish floorball top, Eero Kosonen’s titles and achievements are still few. One Finnish title and a silver, two WFC silver medals. “As an individual, I always set myself goals to be worked towards but I’ll also split them into smaller ones and remember to enjoy every day because you never know what may happen tomorrow. Right now my goals are just to get to know my new team and its players and to be ready when the season starts in September. From there on, I will be working towards next spring and of course the 2016 WFC”, Eero Kosonen states.