European Leagues Thread

[Soldiers from Neva]

And now it appears will be new champion of KHL...

[Tasku]

Espoo Blues has taken their second win in the semifinal against JYP.

In support, my avatar must change!

Go Espoo!!!

[Saapas]

Espoo Blues has taken their second win in the semifinal against JYP.

In support, my avatar must change!

Go Espoo!!!

My playoff beard is growing slow and steadily It would be huge if Blues dropped the winners of regular season as they already dropped Ässät that were 3rd

[Tasku]

Indeed. I just hope Lukko would beat the fudge out of HIFK. Blues hasn't been very good against HIFK. But it's not happening...

[Calv]

Any French magnus fans in here at all?

[Jypfan92]

Sami Kapanen will make comeback. He has made 2-year-contract with KalPa (=himself ). He retired after 09-10 season after scoring 15+31=46 points in 49 regular season games and 6+7=13 points in 13 playoff games.

[Tasku]

Espoo Blues has reached the finals. I hope they can brake the spell against HIFK and win them for once.

Or morelike, win four times, not once. That just wouldn't be enough.

[djskek]

DEL Final 2010/2011

Grizzly Adams Wolfsburg - Eisbären Berlin

The Eisbären Berlin won a few minutes ago the 5th and deciding game in the semi-finals with 3-1 against the DEG Metro Stars (Düsseldorf)

[djskek]

Berlin won the first Final-Game 4:2 against Wolfsburg!

[YZG]

Any French magnus fans in here at all?

Well, maybe not a fan of the league properly speaking, but I do follow from times to times what happens there, mainly for Épinal as I have a friend from there who is a fan of the Dolphins.

- YZG

[Calv]

Any French magnus fans in here at all?

Well, maybe not a fan of the league properly speaking, but I do follow from times to times what happens there, mainly for Épinal as I have a friend from there who is a fan of the Dolphins.

- YZG

Fair enough, look out for Colin Shields over there. He just left the British league to join Morzine next season. Probably one of the best British forwards in Ice Hockey(that's not saying THAT much!!)

[YZG]

Will do. That'll make two British in the Magnus with Greg Owen in Rouen. Stevie Lyle used to tend Morzine's goals a couple seasons ago. Good to see there are some fine British exports in the sport Wasn't Shield drafted to the NHL at some point? I know he had a few seasons in the ECHL.

- YZG

[Calv]

Yeah Shields was the 2nd ever British trained player to be drafted in the NHL.

Greg Owen left France a couple of seasons ago & went to Coventry in the EIHL.

Ben O'Connor spent last season at Morzine (why do all the Brits tend to go to Morzine?!?!), although it looks likely he'll be back in Britain next season

[Jypfan92]

HIFK won Sm-league this year. They won all 4 matches against Espoo Blues. Ville Peltonen was hero of last match scoring hattrick. Juha-Pekka Haataja scored most points in playoffs (8+8=16) with Mikael Granlund (5+11=16). It's 7th championship for HIFK, last became with real supergroup at 97-98. Then they had Olli Jokinen, Brian Rafalski, Kimmo Timonen, Toni Lydman, Jarkko Ruutu, Niklas Hagman, Jere Karalahti, Jan Caloun, Johan Davidsson, Christian Ruuttu etc.

[djskek]

Eisbären Berlin are the new DEL-Champion! Berlin won 3:0 the Final-Games against Wolfsburg!

4:2
5:4
5:4

Partyyyyy!

[Círyatan]

Sad news. My hometown team, Stoczniowiec Gdańsk, has withdrawn from next year's Polish Hockey League season. Several years of bad management have left the once proud club with no money. Most of the first team players have already signed with other teams, and the youth academy will probably be dispersed.

Another sad chapter in the recent pathetic history of Polish hockey. Hard to have any hope for the better right now.

[batdad]

That totally sucks for you. You are going to have to go and watch novice players in another town? Maybe discover the next Krystoff Oliwa? Or Mariusz?

THere is no way I could live somewhere without a team. Just not possible for me. And the way I am now...they would have to be able to skate. So I cannot ever move to England.

[YZG]

Sad news. My hometown team, Stoczniowiec Gdańsk, has withdrawn from next year's Polish Hockey League season. Several years of bad management have left the once proud club with no money. Most of the first team players have already signed with other teams, and the youth academy will probably be dispersed.

Another sad chapter in the recent pathetic history of Polish hockey. Hard to have any hope for the better right now.

Sorry to hear that. Did the sponsors all pull out as well and make it impossible for the club to keep going, or is it that even with them pouring money in, the team can't continue to exist? Any plans for a comeback the year after or it smells like it's folding for good? It's sad nevertheless, I think Stocznia has won several league and Cup titles (well, league at least).

What the heck happened to Polish hockey? The country used to be much better than this at hockey, with several Olympic participations and players like Czerkawski and Oliwa, but also Kosyl, Gruth, Christ, Obłój...

- YZG

[Círyatan]

Thanks for the kind words, YZG.

What happened to hockey in Poland? Well, it's a long story, and I'm probably not the best person to tell that... I have to admit I am a lot more interested in North American hockey, and I'm not proud of that at all, but well, this tells you something already.

Generally, hockey is not very popular around here, and that's probably an understatement. Handball, volleyball, basketball and, especially, football are vastly more popular in Poland. Heck, maybe even speedway! My parents tell me that in the days of their youth it was different, but for as long as I can remember the situation has simply been disastrous... The problem is, there are almost no sponsors, so most of the clubs are barely functioning. Today I tried visiting the website of another PLH (Polska Liga Hokejowa=Polish Hockey League) club, KH Sanok (link) and, well, you can see for yourself. The note says: "Due to the unprofessional attitude of Ciarko KH Sanok towards the club's official website and the lack of funds for site maintenance, the website's functioning is suspended indefinitely."

Apart from lack of popularity, I think the main reason for the demise of Polish hockey is the incompetence of people who are responsible for managing the clubs and the league. People who never noticed that communism here ended over 20 years ago, and a change of mentality is desperately needed. People who think that having a sports team equals simple profit. Corruption, too.

As to Stocznia... (for those of you who don't know: "stoczniowiec" means "shipyard worker" and "stocznia" means "shipyard"... that's the club's affectionate nickname) I feel kind of guilty, however funny that may sound... I've never been an avid supporter, been only to a couple odd games in my lifetime, but I promised to get myself a season ticket for next year and really start following. Now it seems I won't get a chance. There is some talk of a possible comeback the next year, but who knows... I've heard a lot of promises from various people in my life and now I prefer to be cautious.

Tadeusz Obłój was in fact the last coach of Stoczniowiec, but is now back to coaching in Iserlohn. Henryk Gruth coaches ZSC Lions juniors (Switzerland), and has recently won his fourth championship title in five years. I don't know what's up with Walery Kosyl and Jerzy Christ... gotta check. Czerkawski I really loved, especially in his Islanders days. Oliwa's a moron, though.

batdad: the nearest city with any kind of hockey team is Toruń, some 170 km from here. Last year there was some talk of Stoczniowiec playing at their rink during the renovation of the Olivia Ice Hall in Gdańsk as it was the nearest venue. Fun fact: when the local curling team couldn't practise in Gdańsk (they're all amateurs, so they could only practice late in the evenings, and eventually they were denied access to the ice hall because they were making too much noise ), they had to fly to Sweden every weekend for practice. Cool, eh?

[YZG]

Ouch... it seems it's a mountain that has to be climbed Is a guy like Czerkawski still involved in Polish hockey? Maybe a couple of guys who've played or been involved with hockey abroad could bring something positive. Not change everything, but at least clean up some things. The bad part of things now is that if the quality of the sport in the country declines, the interest in it will keep declining as well. And it will die off if nothing is done. It happens in Ukraine too. On the other hand, you have countries like Ireland where there's been some kind of a hockey craze growing in the last years following the organization of the Division III World Championships where the local side did very well (2007 if memory serves right). It was soon followed by the establishment of a real domestic league and a development league, and the interest for these grew. Then there's KHL Medveščak Zagreb, which became very succesful at the gates when they joined the EBEL - and hockey is quite a niche sport in Croatia!

Maybe what Poland needs is one or two teams playing in a higher quality league to revive interest in the sport and improve it's quality. If the DEL was willing to let foreign clubs in, I think a club, the healthiest in Poland or a new one in the capital, made up of essentially the NT and a few good imports could probably qualify for a playoff berth regularly. KHL is probably too high an aim, but it's rumoured they will eventually add an Italian team, in which case a Polish side wouldn't be out of place there. Question is: who'd invest in this?

- YZG

[Manimal]

How many people goes to team practices?

In Skellefteå, Sweden they had 5,600 people showing up for the first practice session fo the season!
That is over 93% of the capacity of their arena

[Manimal]

I just read the Olimpija Ljubljana of the Austrian EBEL pulled their goalie during shoot-outs!
It was made so that they would not meet up with league powerhouse Salzburg in the play-offs.
Needless to say, the coach and the goalie got suspended and the team was fined

[Tasku]

That's what you call terrible sportsmanship. Not cool at all!

[Alessandro]

Well I think it was a polemic against Austrian teams getting a "good" treatment...

[nino33]

polemic

Thanks Alessandro for teaching me a new word!