Veli-Matti Savinainen

Veli-Matti Savinainen (born on January 5, 1986 in Espoo) is a Finnish professional ice hockey winger/center who currently plays for the Jokerit of the KHL.

Club career
Savinainen started his junior career with the Blues organisation. He did not play during the 2002-03 season. Since 2003, he played junior hockey with the FoPS organisation. He made his senior debut in the 2005-06 season. It was his last junior season in which he played 1 game with the junior team of the FoPS and 35 games with the FPS of the Mestis.

He stayed with the FPS of the Mestis for the 2006-07 season. After that, he signed with the Ässät of the SM-liiga where he stayed until the end of the 2012-13 season. Besides his 48 games played in the 2007-08 season, he also played 2 games on loan with the KooKoo of the Mestis during this season. In the 2012-13 season, he won the SM-liiga title with the Ässät.

Savinainen continued his career with the Yugra Khanty-Mansiysk of the KHL during the 2013-14 season.

He joined the Leksands IF of the SHL on a one-year contract on August 30, 2014. He played there 24 games, then he moved to play with the Torpedo Nizhny Novgorod of the KHL where he finished the season with 25 regular season games and 4 play-off games played.

After that, Savinainen played during the 2015-16 and 2016-17 seasons with the Tappara of the Liiga (formerly SM-liiga) winning the title in both seasons. In the 2016-17 season, he also won the Aarne Honkvaara Trophy for the player who scored most goals (30) throughout the season, was also the player who scored most game-winning goals (8) and made it into the Liiga All-Star Team.

After completing his second stint with Yugra Khanty-Mansiysk of the KHL in the 2017-18 season, posting 17 points in 50 games, Savinainen left as a free agent but opted to continue in the KHL, in joining the Kunlun Red Star on a one-year contract on May 2, 2018.

Following his lone season with the Kunlun Red Star in the 2018-19 season, Savinainen returned to Finland to continue in the KHL, signing a two-year contract with the Jokerit on May 4, 2019.

International career
Savinainen played with the Finnish National Team at the 2013, 2014, 2017, 2018 and 2019 World Championship s. He won the silver medal at the 2014 tournament and the gold medal at the 2019 tournament. At the 2017 tournament, he was one of the top 3 players of Finland at the championship. He also participated at the 2018 Olympics.