Reinforcement with international Finnish full-back, Piri Soiri, for Athens Kallithea

Soiri, 29, is a regular starter for the Finland men’s national team and won back-to-back Finnish championships with HJK Helsinki before signing for UEFA Conference League side Universitatea Craiova midway through last season. Now he is set to bring speed and experience at both ends for AKFC.

Born in the Finnish town of Ekenas, Soiri spent most of his childhood in Mozambique, Namibia, and Tanzania before eventually returning to Finland and emerging from MyPa’s youth academy, where he made his professional debut at the age of 17. Over the next five seasons – two more seasons with MyPa, followed by three seasons at VPS – Soiri made a total of 112 appearances in the Finnish top flight with 15 goals and 10 assists.

Soiri went abroad for the next four seasons, playing in the Belarusian Premier League with Shakhtyor Soligorsk, the Austrian Bundesliga with Admira Wacker and the Danish Superliga with Esbjerg fB, before returning home to Finland’s biggest club , HJK Helsinki.

In the 2022 and 2023 seasons, Soiri helped HJK Helsinki to their third and fourth consecutive championships, respectively, making 69 total appearances with four goals and four assists in all competitions, including 26 total appearances with two assists in UEFA competitions.

Following a winter move to Craiova, Soiri made six appearances for the club in the second half of the 2023/24 season before being acquired by AKFC.

As an international, Soiri has made 45 appearances for the Finnish National Team, scoring seven goals and providing four assists. In 2019, Soiri was key in qualifying to help Finland reach their first ever major tournament, UEFA Euro 2020. Soiri made one appearance at the tournament in a 1–0 loss to Russia. His most recent appearance came last month in a friendly against Portugal.