Matti Lähitie (born 13 February 1985) is a Finnish professional

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

coach and a former player. He played as a defender or defensive

midfielder A midfielder is an outfield position in association football. Midfielders may play an exclusively defensive role, breaking up attacks, and are in that case known as defensive midfielders. As central midfielders often go across boundarie ...

Playing career

Lähitie started his

career at Finnish club

FC Jazz FC Jazz is a football club from Pori, Finland. It plays in the Finnish third tier Kakkonen. It was invented in 1934. FC Jazz has won two Finnish championships ( 1993 & 1996 ). History PPT 1934–1991 FC Jazz was established in 1934 as ...

, where he made his league debut at the age of just seventeen years old. In total he made forty appearances at FC Jazz between 2002 and 2004, scoring twice. In 2005, he signed with FC Lahti who were playing in Veikkausliiga at the time. Lähitie saw this as a step-up in his career, with Finland internationals such as Jari Litmanen,

Pekka Lagerblom Pekka Sakari Lagerblom (born 19 October 1982) is a Finnish former professional footballer who played as a midfielder. Notably, he won the German double of Bundesliga and DFB-Pokal with Werder Bremen in 2004. Club career FC Lahti Born in Lahti, ...

and

Mika Väyrynen Mika Väyrynen (born 28 December 1981) is a Swedish-born Finnish former footballer. Club career Early career Väyrynen started his career with FC Lahti and joined FC Jokerit for the 2001 season. Heerenveen Midway through that year SC Heerenv ...

also playing for Lahti. In 2006 Lähitie moved to his third Finnish club, JJK playing in the Ykkönen.

External links

FC JJK official website

Guardian Football
{{DEFAULTSORT:Lahitie, Matti 1985 births Living people Finnish men's footballers Men's association football midfielders FC Lahti players Seinäjoen Jalkapallokerho players JJK Jyväskylä players Veikkausliiga players Sportspeople from Pori Footballers from Satakunta