The Estonian Football Federation hailed dozens of fans who shovelled snow from the Baltic country's national stadium on Wednesday and enabled a friendly against Canada to go ahead.

"We thank everybody who helped us to clear the stadium," said FA president Aivar Pohlak upon announcing that the Wednesday evening match would go ahead as planned.

With Tallinn hit by unexpectedly heavy snow as the national team prepared to face the Canadians, the association had late Tuesday urged fans to come and help clear the A. Le Coq Arena.

Over 40 supporters turned up in response on Wednesday, enabling the pitch to be playable in time for the 18:00 local time kick off, even though the snowfall had not let up, the association said.

It added that fans who no longer wished to spent 90 minutes in the cold would be allowed to sell their tickets back to the match organisers, rather than losing their money for failing to attend.

Besides threatening the football, the snowstorm blocked the rest of Tallinn, where municipal workers worked flat out to clear roads.

Elsewhere the storm, which had begun late Tuesday, also halted ferry traffic between the Estonian mainland and its Baltic Sea islands.

According to the Estonian Institute of Meteorology and Hydrology, the heaviest snow was in the southern town of Valga, where 21 centimetres (eight inches) fell overnight on Tuesday.