FPS

Nobody in Forssa needs a derby name to know what a game against KooVee means. There's no official label for it, but the matches against the Tampere club carry the weight of a rivalry regardless, and HPK Hämeenlinna sits close enough, geographically and competitively, to matter almost as much — it was HPK that finished ahead of FPS at the top of the I-divisioona table in 1981-82, the season the club's best modern run began.

That team went on to beat Lukko in the SM-liiga qualification round before Vaasan Sport ended the promotion bid. FPS had already tasted the top flight by then, having gone up from the I-divisioona in 1975 and spent two seasons, 1975-76 and 1976-77, among Finland's elite before coming back down. Alpo Suhonen played and coached that side.

Its ice hockey section only began in 1951, two decades after the wider sports club was founded, and it found its way into a few notable careers. Niklas Bäckström spent 1999-2000 there on loan from HIFK before the NHL years that made his name; Antti Miettinen passed through on a similar path. Esa Keskinen started out at FPS in the early 1980s before he became a fixture at TPS. The club has kept three numbers out of circulation since — Jarkko Aaltonen's 8, Mika Helkearo's 15, Kari Lindqvist's 11.

Home games are played in front of up to 3,000 people at the Forssa Ice Hall, known simply as Vihreät, through every level of the Finnish pyramid it has occupied.