Today at On This Football Day we’d like to wish one of football’s more eccentric characters a very Happy Birthday. The mad Finnish midfielder Aki Riihilahti is thirty-one today. Whilst his performances for the likes of Crystal Palace were not that of a Cruyff or a Maradona, Aki was hard-working on the pitch and a bit of a live-wire off it.

Riihilahti, who lists his occupation as “motor of midfield, writer, a human”, joined Palace in 2001 and quickly became a cult hero as fans took to his industrious attitude as he became a pivotal part of the team that achieved promotion via the play-offs in 2004.

To attempt to get into Aki’s psyche, here’s a section from Aki’s latest entry on his very entertaining website as he discusses his lack of match fitness: “The average running speed with a hamstring that is cramping is the same of an experienced hungry camel.” Obviously.



His weekly columns in The Times are equally hilarious. With titles like “I’m Not the Borat of the Bundesliga” and “Gold Medal? I Prefer Pizza”, his musings are well worth a read if you’re bored, like Joey Barton, of the “I had a crap World Cup, buy my book” school of football literati. Palace chairman Simon Jordan sums Aki up nicely when he says “Aki Riihilahti, a ridiculous person in the best possible way - committed, brilliant work ethic, bit bonkers and totally engaging.”

Aki laments the fact that his birth in 1976 was not widely celebrated, as it happened on the same day that Chairman Mao joined the great Cultural Revolution in the sky, but here at OTFD we’d like to wish him many happy returns and urge him to come back tomorrow for a subject that’s close to his heart.

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