The Finnish men's football team lost 2-1 to Northern Ireland in Belfast on Sunday night, leaving coach Mixu Paatelainen struggling to plot a course that will see his team make it to the European Championship finals in France next year.
Northern Ireland's excellent form in this campaign has put them in a strong position to qualify from Group F, and they got off to a powerful start in Belfast when a Chris Baird header was ruled out for offside after 7 minutes.
Kyle Lafferty soon opened the scoring though, and added a second on 38 minutes after lax marking from Finland allowed him to flick a header past Lukas Hradecky in the Finnish goal. Berat Sadik pulled a goal back in injury time but it was too little too late for the Finns.
The result leaves Finland eight points adrift of Northern Ireland in second place in the group, and 9 nine points behind Romania in first place. Coach Mixu Paatelainen, whose contract runs out at the end of this qualification campaign, now faces intensifying pressure from supporters to step down.
Finland's next qualifier is in Helsinki on 13 June against Hungary.
This story has been edited to add the name of the Finnish goalscorer.
