Football Season Guide

Dramatically missed out on a top three finish last season and this resulted in a managerial change during the winter. Stahre left to be replaced by Andreas Alm, manager of AIK for five seasons up to 2016. He took a year off last term. The new gaffer didn’t make too many changes to the squad though and he seems happy with the players he discovered upon arrival. Abubakari and Yasin are the two most notable departures from the team, with the latter really influential in the second part of 2017 when he enjoyed a successful loan with Hacken. So far Alm hasn’t made any hugely famous new signings too and probably the most notable arrival is that of centre forward Lundberg from Maritimo. He will add extra depth to the front line where Paulinho and Kamara are likely to remain the preferred starters. With all of the starters in defence and midfield likely to be the same as last season Hacken are expected to have good synchrony from round 1 and they hope that this could see them starting the campaign well and putting pressure on the other teams battling for the top positions. Faltsetas will remain Hacken’s most important player in the middle of the park and if the experienced playmaker is healthy and able to maintain the level of football shown last autumn Hacken will definitely be a force to be reckoned with. The slight worry is that the team doesn’t have too much depth in the inner midfielder positions where only four other players apart from Faltsetas are naturals. From them Ackermann is only 16, while Berggren and Skoglund are returning from loans in the lower division and they also seem too young to be ready for regular top flight action. The transfer window is not closed though and Alm is actively looking to sign one or two more players, so the transfer activity of the team should be monitored closely in the next few weeks.