Did you know that Santa lives in Finland and that he even has his very own football team? Too good to be true? Well, it’s not!
We’re in Rovaniemi, Lapland, in the far north of Finland, where the temperatures have already plunged to minus 10 degrees. It has been known to get as cold as minus 38. The city of Rovaniemi is widely known as the home of Santa Claus, which has turned this remote spot into a world-class resort and center of Christmas spirit. And because Santa, like everybody else, loves the beautiful game, the city gave him his very own soccer team, the FC Santa Claus. Legend has it that Santa Claus himself approached people from the world of football and asked them to create a team for him. And while in other parts of the world winter is a rather quiet time for football, this is peak season for the world’s most Christmassy football club in the Baltic tundra of deep, dark Finland.