When Niko Ikävalko, the Sporting Director of Finland's FC KTP, placed an ad on TransferRoom for a midfielder on loan to provide the creative spark for their long-awaited return to the Finnish top flight, little did he know what was to come.

With a minimal budget and very few contacts outside of Finland, Ikävalko quickly and transparently made decision-makers at more than 650 clubs in 60 countries aware of his needs in the transfer market, with full financial disclosure.

What transpired was a whistle-stop trip to Venice, a long-term strategic tie-up and the arrival on loan of three youth internationals - Gabriel Pecile, Jack de Vries and Gustav Sandberg (pictured together, left to right) - with the promise of more to come in future seasons.

All from the initial click of a button on the TransferRoom platform.

As Ikävalko states in the video below: “I put an ad in TransferRoom for a Number 10 and I got a message from Alex Menta at Venezia who said he would have a good suggestion for us for a partnership if we are interested and could we have a call about that. Of course I knew because it came from TransferRoom it was real. If somebody had sent me this out of nowhere, I would have thought, ‘What is this?’ Because we are so small compared to them.”

For KTP, it was a case of being in the right place at the right time, with the right connections.

“Without TransferRoom, Venezia would never have called us to ask to do this partnership. For us this was like a lottery win,” he adds.

Venezia were already considering such a tie-up as a means of finding regular first-team playing experience for some of their young talents.

The KTP ad, coupled with a recommendation of Ikävalko through one of his players, prompted Menta to log into TransferRoom’s secure messaging system.

He tells TransferRoom: “We needed a club who we could trust and who was really professional. I have two Finnish players in my team, one of whom is friends with Nico. They told me to reach out and send a message. I didn’t want to wait to find a way to get his number, so I just reached out straight away on TransferRoom.

“Direct contact just makes everything so much easier. You don’t have to go through someone who goes through another person just to find a number. That can be so time consuming. TransferRoom cuts through the time so much faster.”

That one message has resulted in a partnership that could result in Venezia regularly loaning up to three players (per FIFA rules) to KTP each season.

Menta adds: “KTP is highly professional. The Owner and Sporting Director came to come visit us in Venice and immediately you understood from them that they're genuinely serious. It’s not just a smaller club looking for good talent. I trust them a lot with our players.”

Image credit: FC KTP