The Offical British Hockey Thread 2007-2008

Loosie · Post by **Loosie** » Fri Apr 11, 2008 8:44 pm

How exactly do teams quliafy for the Challenge Cup and the Knockout Cup? And what kind of formats are the tournament?

Post by **Calv** » Fri Apr 11, 2008 9:35 pm

All teams from the EIHL have the option to enter the Knockout Cup & the Challenge Cup.

The Knockout cup, regarded as the lesser of the 2, only had 8 teams in this year, with Sheffield & Nottingham opting out due to lack of available ice time at their respective arenas. It is a straight knockout tournament going Quarter finals , Semi finals and then the Finals. Each round is a 2-legged format. This year it was won by Coventry Blaze

The Challenge cup is the more prestigious of the 2 cups and all EIHL teams enter. The league is split into 2 groups. Each team plays one game against the other teams in their group, 2 being at home & 2 being away. The top 2 from each group go into the semi finals and then the winners of those meet in the the final. Both Semis & the final are 2-legged. Nottingham Panthers won this years cup.

Post by **Calv** » Tue Apr 15, 2008 10:57 pm

Team GB lost 2-1 after penalty shots to Poland and then 10-5 against hosts Austria(including Tomas Vanek). Not the best start but we never expected to beat Austria, where we scored 5 of our 12 shots, and we came close against Poland. We meet South Korea in our next match, which is a must win game for us.

Post by **Calv** » Sat Apr 19, 2008 11:00 am

Team GB beat Korea 4-1 and then the Netherlands 8-1 to climb up to 4th in the table. If we beat Kazakhstan tonight then we get either silver or bronze medal depending on the Austria - Poland score. Come GB

Post by **batdad** » Sat Apr 19, 2008 10:03 pm

Bronze meadl in what? Group Q???

But yeah Brits!!! I actually would love to see them rise up the ranks of World Hockey. I want to see the English battle the Israelis.

Kidding--If they are playing with Austria and Poland they must be in the level below the top tier? Or has Austria fallen to the 3rd one?

Post by **Calv** » Sun Apr 20, 2008 12:25 am

We're in division 1 group A

Alas we lost 3-1 today to Kazakhstan,despite Murphy turning away 45 shots we were unable to score more than one despite hitting the post. This means we finish 4th, which isn't bad considering 12 months ago we were in a relegation playoff and we're ranked 29th in the world, compared to Poland(20), Austria(17) & Kazakhstan(16). Even Netherlands are 24th!

grazza · Post by **grazza** » Sun Apr 20, 2008 9:41 pm

batdad wrote:Bronze meadl in what? Group Q???

But yeah Brits!!! I actually would love to see them rise up the ranks of World Hockey. I want to see the English battle the Israelis.

Kidding--If they are playing with Austria and Poland they must be in the level below the top tier? Or has Austria fallen to the 3rd one?

Just the English? not the Scots as well. maybe like me you would like to see a Scottish International hocky team

Lets not forget the good Welsh and Northern Irish people also.

Post by **Calv** » Sat Apr 26, 2008 8:45 pm

EIHL wrote: The bmibaby Elite Ice Hockey League 2007-08 season finished with the stunning playoff finals at the start of April. September will see the next competitive game and already plans are well under way for clubs to enhance the competition and deliver even greater entertainment for the fans.

The 2007-08 season saw all but one of the ten teams make it through to either the semi-finals of the two cup competitions or the final four teams at the playoff weekend. Most of the competitions were decided by the narrowest of margins and even required penalty shootouts.

The silverware was shared out between the Coventry Blaze, Nottingham Panthers and the Sheffield Steelers. For the first time in many years, both the Basingstoke Bison and Edinburgh Capitals reached the semi-finals of the British Knock-Out Cup with Basingstoke narrowly defeated in the final by Coventry.

However always wanting to improve the offering to fans, sponsors and the clubs, the league have adopted a new plan which should see the competition within league games even closer when the 2008-09 season gets under way.

The dynamics of the league means that there are teams playing from large arenas while others are using smaller capacity rinks.

For the 2008-09 season, traditionally clubs that are regarded as the regularly more successful teams will, as was the case in 2007-08, ice only ten International Transfer Card (ITC) players. The teams are Belfast, Coventry, Nottingham and Sheffield however, these teams are also more likely to spend closer to the maximum permitted salary cap.

Salary declarations are required to be made to the league and any other team that wishes to spend closer to the maximum salary cap will also be restricted to the same allowance of ten ITC players on their roster.

The remaining teams will be allowed to recruit and ice eleven ITC players on their roster and this is anticipated to result in there being greater parity between clubs during the league campaign.

Chairman of the Elite League Eamon Convery said on Saturday, “Clubs are very supportive of the initiative as they all wish to see teams perform both home and away at the highest possible standards. Tight competitive games are important to keep fans excited about how their team is likely to perform. We all are confident this initiative will deliver an even better product on the ice for both home and away fans.”

Director of Hockey Andy French stated, “It is great to see clubs who are naturally competitors on the ice working together and understanding that the closer the competitiveness is, the better it will be for the league.”

It remains to be seen whether this initiative works, the richer clubs will always be able to get round the salary cap(one way is to offer the players wives/partners 'jobs' to lower the salary of the players) and the top four teams all have more sponsorship, bigger attendances thus they will be the teams spending upto the salary cap. So the teams lwoer down, although they will be allowed 11 imports they may not be able to afford them, especially as the PR seems to indicate that there will be 2 salary caps one for the bigger clubs and a lower one for the smaller clubs. Doesn't make sense to me!

Andrew R · Post by **Andrew R** » Mon Apr 28, 2008 10:33 am

Calv wrote:
EIHL wrote: The bmibaby Elite Ice Hockey League 2007-08 season finished with the stunning playoff finals at the start of April. September will see the next competitive game and already plans are well under way for clubs to enhance the competition and deliver even greater entertainment for the fans.

The 2007-08 season saw all but one of the ten teams make it through to either the semi-finals of the two cup competitions or the final four teams at the playoff weekend. Most of the competitions were decided by the narrowest of margins and even required penalty shootouts.

The silverware was shared out between the Coventry Blaze, Nottingham Panthers and the Sheffield Steelers. For the first time in many years, both the Basingstoke Bison and Edinburgh Capitals reached the semi-finals of the British Knock-Out Cup with Basingstoke narrowly defeated in the final by Coventry.

However always wanting to improve the offering to fans, sponsors and the clubs, the league have adopted a new plan which should see the competition within league games even closer when the 2008-09 season gets under way.

The dynamics of the league means that there are teams playing from large arenas while others are using smaller capacity rinks.

For the 2008-09 season, traditionally clubs that are regarded as the regularly more successful teams will, as was the case in 2007-08, ice only ten International Transfer Card (ITC) players. The teams are Belfast, Coventry, Nottingham and Sheffield however, these teams are also more likely to spend closer to the maximum permitted salary cap.

Salary declarations are required to be made to the league and any other team that wishes to spend closer to the maximum salary cap will also be restricted to the same allowance of ten ITC players on their roster.

The remaining teams will be allowed to recruit and ice eleven ITC players on their roster and this is anticipated to result in there being greater parity between clubs during the league campaign.

Chairman of the Elite League Eamon Convery said on Saturday, “Clubs are very supportive of the initiative as they all wish to see teams perform both home and away at the highest possible standards. Tight competitive games are important to keep fans excited about how their team is likely to perform. We all are confident this initiative will deliver an even better product on the ice for both home and away fans.”

Director of Hockey Andy French stated, “It is great to see clubs who are naturally competitors on the ice working together and understanding that the closer the competitiveness is, the better it will be for the league.”
It remains to be seen whether this initiative works, the richer clubs will always be able to get round the salary cap(one way is to offer the players wives/partners 'jobs' to lower the salary of the players) and the top four teams all have more sponsorship, bigger attendances thus they will be the teams spending upto the salary cap. So the teams lwoer down, although they will be allowed 11 imports they may not be able to afford them, especially as the PR seems to indicate that there will be 2 salary caps one for the bigger clubs and a lower one for the smaller clubs. Doesn't make sense to me!

Hmmm, interesting. The first thing that strikes me is surely if teams like, say, Hull, are spending less money on more imports than, say, Sheffield, surely those 11 imports will be on significantly lower wages (and probably therefore, lower quality) than the 10 imports the bigger clubs would be able to bring in. Either that, or the smaller clubs will be spending less on Brits in order to free up money for imports. Although seeing as Nottingham's owner has allegedly already said that they will go over the cap this season, I wonder whether the salary declarations will be much use anyway.

Still, at least it will hopefully ensure the Elite fans will all have a club to watch this season. I might not even have that, my team Chelmsford Chieftains are struggling to attract the sufficient funds to compete in the EPL.

Post by **Calv** » Mon Apr 28, 2008 1:25 pm

A better explanation of the rules:
1) Sheff, Notts, Belfast, Coventry all broke the cap last year & will be restricted to 10 imports only however much they spend.

2) Teams are allowed 11 imports if they do not spend over the lower salary limit, which is a 10% increase on last years cap, taking the lower limit to £7,810 a week.

3) Teams are allowed to spend over this limit but are only allowed 10 imports, the new cap is 25% higher than last years, taking it to £8,875 a week.

4)No club is allowed to spend over £8,875 a week on salaries. All salaries must be declared and any team breaking £8,875 a week or spending between £7,810 - £8,875 a week but icing 11 imports will be docked 15 points and allowed to ice 9 imports the season after.

I think the original intention was as follows:
There aren't enough import quality brits around, The only names I can think of are Hand, Phillips, Longstaff, Weaver, Tait & Clarke maybe Lyle & Murphy as well. Thus their wage demands will be higher compared to an import of similar standard.
I think that teams were meant to spend the same amount on their first 10 imports and then the bigger clubs spend more for a brit, and the lower clubs spend less on an import(of a similar quality). However with there being such a gap in the different limits I doubt this will happen and the lower teams will end up with an import of a lesser skill level.

It could however mean that all teams play 3-line hockey. For example, last year Phoenix played with 2 forward lines full of 5 imports and Tony Hand. Then the 3rd line was young brits who saw only a few shifts a game. With 11 imports Phoenix could play with 6 import forwards(2 on each line) and a brit on each line as well meaning they will see more ice time. I guess only time will tell

It's sad to hear Chelmsford are having financial trouble, I hope they manage to play on I always thought they were one of the bigger EPL teams(and therefore more financially stable). Hopefully they get bailed out. IT's not been a good year for british clubs getting in financial trouble with Cardiff, Basingstoke & Bracknell all going pretty close to being bust.

Andrew R · Post by **Andrew R** » Mon Apr 28, 2008 1:41 pm

Calv wrote:A better explanation of the rules:
1) Sheff, Notts, Belfast, Coventry all broke the cap last year & will be restricted to 10 imports only however much they spend.

2) Teams are allowed 11 imports if they do not spend over the lower salary limit, which is a 10% increase on last years cap, taking the lower limit to £7,810 a week.

3) Teams are allowed to spend over this limit but are only allowed 10 imports, the new cap is 25% higher than last years, taking it to £8,875 a week.

4)No club is allowed to spend over £8,875 a week on salaries. All salaries must be declared and any team breaking £8,875 a week or spending between £7,810 - £8,875 a week but icing 11 imports will be docked 15 points and allowed to ice 9 imports the season after.

I think the original intention was as follows:
There aren't enough import quality brits around, The only names I can think of are Hand, Phillips, Longstaff, Weaver, Tait & Clarke maybe Lyle & Murphy as well. Thus their wage demands will be higher compared to an import of similar standard.
I think that teams were meant to spend the same amount on their first 10 imports and then the bigger clubs spend more for a brit, and the lower clubs spend less on an import(of a similar quality). However with there being such a gap in the different limits I doubt this will happen and the lower teams will end up with an import of a lesser skill level.

It could however mean that all teams play 3-line hockey. For example, last year Phoenix played with 2 forward lines full of 5 imports and Tony Hand. Then the 3rd line was young brits who saw only a few shifts a game. With 11 imports Phoenix could play with 6 import forwards(2 on each line) and a brit on each line as well meaning they will see more ice time. I guess only time will tell

It's sad to hear Chelmsford are having financial trouble, I hope they manage to play on I always thought they were one of the bigger EPL teams(and therefore more financially stable). Hopefully they get bailed out. IT's not been a good year for british clubs getting in financial trouble with Cardiff, Basingstoke & Bracknell all going pretty close to being bust.

We're now one of the smaller teams in the division after the EPL absorbed some of the teams from the BNL. Naturally these teams had bigger budgets and so in order to compete with them, everyone else's budgets have increased as well. Maybe dropping to the English National League would be the answer, I don't know. Apparently to even get a team on the ice next year would be £30-£40,000, you can double that to get a competitive team. For the attendances and coverage we get, sponsoring the team is not the most cost-effective way to advertise, let's put it like that. I know that the previous owners of the club had to re-mortgage their house to keep the team going.

Someone who's got pots of cash and is willing to bankroll the club and underwrite losses would be ideal really. Think I might start buying lottery tickets again...

Post by **Calv** » Tue Apr 29, 2008 7:04 pm

Another explanation of the new rules!

This time from the Phoenix GM

“Basically, the moves are intended to bring about a greater degree of parity and even more competitiveness within the regular league season. The ten clubs don’t all have identical financial budgets. The top four clubs from last season will stick at 10 ITC players and have the facility to spend up to a new ‘hard’ cap level albeit with a substantial levy payable to the league for the privilege. The other six clubs can add an eleventh if they choose to do so, but only by staying under the new ‘soft’ cap. And once all clubs have declared their position and where they’ll be in relation to the two cap levels, anyone breaking their situation will be severely punished with a deduction of 15 points and a reduction to 9 in the number of ITC players they would be able to recruit for season 2009-10.”

I like the bit about the top teams ppaying a levy to the league, hopefully that money will go to the smaller teams, meaning they will be able to spend up to the 'soft cap' and get 11 good imports rather than 11 average ones.

Post by **archibalduk** » Tue Apr 29, 2008 10:08 pm

Sounds interesting but I'm not convinced. Surely those teams that the more money but only a ten ITC limit can use their money to attract the best British players. So the money they would have spent on a foreign player can be used on top British players.

The poorer teams, whilst they can have that extra ITC player, aren't going to be able to afford the better foreign players. So aren't they still going to be in the same situation as the season just gone?

Post by **batdad** » Tue Apr 29, 2008 10:22 pm

You two look way too much alike now. Meaning Calv and Archi. I know you are brothers, but man you ain't identical twins. I just gonna call you Henrietta and Daniella from now on.

Post by **archibalduk** » Wed Apr 30, 2008 10:18 pm

Tony Hand rules!

Post by **batdad** » Wed Apr 30, 2008 10:24 pm

Hey henrietta how are you? Or is that Daniella?

Post by **Calv** » Thu May 08, 2008 10:30 am

Sad to hear that Chelmsford Chieftains have gone bust, and will be playing ENL hockey next season

Andrew R · Post by **Andrew R** » Thu May 08, 2008 1:43 pm

Calv wrote:Sad to hear that Chelmsford Chieftains have gone bust, and will be playing ENL hockey next season

Beat me to it Calv. I'm trying to look on the bright side at the moment, at least there will still be hockey played under the Chieftains name next year. Still pretty gutted at the moment though. The thought of playing Romford Spitfires rather than Romford Raiders isn't a great one, let's put it like that.

Post by **Calv** » Thu May 15, 2008 12:45 am

Seems like Belfat are going Brit crazy and are signing brits left, right & centre! I'll do a sum up of moves sometime this weekend, but Coventry have just signed NHL 1st round pick Scott Kelman