Anssi Salmela

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Position	Defence
Shoots	Left
Height Weight	6 ft 72 in (3.66 m) 189 lb (86 kg/13 st 7 lb)
NHL Team F. teams	New Jersey Devils Tappara Pelicans
Nationality	Finland
Born	August 13, 1984 (1984-08-13) (age 23), Tampere, FIN
Pro career	2003 – present

Anssi Salmela (born August 13, 1984 in Tampere, Finland) is a Finnish professional ice hockey player (defenceman). He started to play ice hockey in a Finnish hockey team called Ilves. His professional career started in the season 2003–2004 with Finnish SM-liiga side Tappara, where he made his debut on January 24, 2004. His place was settled in Tappara for another year, but the next year he was transferred to Pelicans. In 2007 he moved back to Tappara again. His number was 51 in Tappara, 44 in Pelicans and 2/33 in Team Finland.

He was a member of the Finnish team that won a bronze medal in the World U20 Championship. He made his debut for the senior national team on August 31, 2007. He missed the 2007–2008 competition but was back in the 2008 IIHF World Championships held in Canada in 2008. On May 22, 2008 he signed a one-year, two-way contract with the NHL team New Jersey Devils.

His playing style is very physical and he does certainly not avoid checking the other players. He acts very confidently with the puck and is able to skate very fastly if necessary. Salmela is very qualified and he had many offers from several NHL teams for the season 08–09, but he chose the New Jersey Devils. His weakness is the penalties. This player takes often too many of them (as you can see from the tables below), which affects the game of the rest of the team because they must play shorthanded.

[edit] Career statistics

Regular Season

Season	Team	League	GP	G	A	PTS	PIM
1999–2000	Tappara, Tampere	C-junior, SM-liiga	13	15	12	27	38
2000–2001	Tappara, Tampere	B-junior, SM-liiga	32	7	3	10	24
2001–2002	Tappara, Tampere	B-junior, SM-liiga	11	6	4	10	12
	Tappara, Tampere	A-junior, SM-liiga	26	3	0	7	22
2002–2003	Tappara, Tampere	A-junior, SM-liiga	23	5	9	14	22
2003–2004	Finland	World Hockey Champ. (U20)	7	1	2	3	6
	Tappara, Tampere	A-junior, SM-liiga	27	10	9	19	22
	Tappara, Tampere	SM-liiga	10	0	0	0	2
2004–2005	Tappara, Tampere	A-junior, SM-liiga	10	2	4	6	6
	Tappara, Tampere	SM-liiga	48	1	5	6	49
2005–2006	Tappara, Tampere	SM-liiga	8	0	1	1	0
	Pelicans, Lahti	SM-liiga	4	8	8	16	59
2006–2007	Pelicans, Lahti	SM-liiga	56	11	12	23	58
2007–2008	Tappara, Tampere	SM-liiga	56	16	16	32	40
	Finland	2008 IIHF World Championship	8	0	0	0	37
2008–2009	New Jersey Devils	NHL

Playoffs

Season	Team	League	GP	G	A	PTS	PIM
1999–2000	Tappara, Tampere	C-junior, SM-liiga	3	0	4	4	4
2001–2002	Tappara, Tampere	A-junior, SM-liiga	2	2	1	3	0
2003–2004	Tappara, Tampere	A-junior, SM-liiga	12	5	3	8	4
	Tappara, Tampere	SM-liiga	3	0	0	0	2
2004–2005	Tappara, Tampere	A-junior, SM-liiga	1	0	0	0	0
	Tappara, Tampere	SM-liiga	8	0	0	0	0
2006–2007	Pelicans, Lahti	SM-liiga	6	1	1	2	4
2007–2008	Tappara, Tampere	SM-liiga	11	0	7	7	14
2008–2009	New Jersey Devils	NHL