A Seppo Pörhölä needed in every sport sector

Seppo Pörhölä, former director of the Rovaniemi Ice Hockey Club- Roki (Rovaniemen Kiekko), who became a part and parcel of the club for the last three decades is still serving for the club in various ways even after his retirement in 2021.

Pörhölä, who sacrifices his whole working life for the development of the RoKi and ice hockey, is still found in everywhere whenever he is needed.

Although he is always very reluctant to publicize himself and believes in works, in an exclusive interview with the Daily Finland Pörhölä told about his involvement in the RoKi when it was running in a small scale and the long journey to bring the club to today´s position after construction of Lappi Arena in 2003.

“My involvement in Roki has begun in 1994 when my son started to play ice hockey in the junior team. I started to work with the club as the head coach in 1999. The duty expanded after establishment of the Lappi Arena. I was the first and only employee of the club that time and worked 10 hours to 12 hours daily without any weekly holiday,” Pörhölä said, adding that it was very difficult to work alone.

Comparing to the present scenario, he said that now the club has a total of 10 staff to discharge regular duties and the working situation became much easier to run all the activities smoothly.

Despite playing different key roles in RoKi and National Ice Hockey Federation, Pörhölä, who born in Tornio on October 7, 1953 is still doing different small tasks.

He maintains security, operates clock, manages penalty box during the matches and other events irrespective whether it is big or small, in addition to help the new officials to familiar with their tasks.

“Although I involved in RoKi activities by chance, not by choice, I started to get interest in my work and it became my hobby gradually,” he said.

He said that he has been organizing an ice hockey event called ´Harrastekiekko Rovaniemi´ for the armatures where about 240 players take part every year and he wished to organise the event as long as possible.

The cordial behaviours and cooperative attitudes make Pörhölä popular among the players, guardians and club officials and he said he is very much happy and satisfied for dedicating himself to the ice hockey arena.

Pörhölä said that the love and affections he received from the people significantly encouraged him.

“When I go to the markets and visit the public places every time I find few people there to say hello to me and most of them were known to me at the Lappi Arena,” said the veteran sports organiser, who considers such relations as a great achievement in his life.