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2015-16 Champions Hockey League

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Djurgarden vs Rauma is normally a very interesting game. But only 978 attendacnce in this big stadium!
What is that? I think the CHL has no future!
 
So what's the level of CHL hockey in your opinion guys? From what I watched till now its pretty fun, competitive and quite intense hockey. In a nutshell it's more entertaining than czech league imo. Attendance is a mess but its hard to find any logic in it.
 
It's the second year for this thing, you have to give it some time. If it makes it into year's three and four, then people will start to realize it's not a fly by night operation and probably start coming out to support it. Getting KHL teams to participate couldn't hurt either.

I'd also like to see the rest of the Euro leagues, like Poland, MOL, Latvia and Kazakhstan participating, although a play in for the lower tier leagues wouldn't be a bad idea.
 
Attendance is worse than I imagined it would be. Feels like there's more parity this year but it hasn't had any effect on nr of spectators so far, at least. The hockey is really good. i don't get it. Are there too many games in the year?
 
Slimmy said:
Are there too many games in the year?
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A lot of people would probably say so, yes. Especially from a economic standpoint. A lot of people can't really afford to attend all those games, so they find more affordable ways to do it.

Many SHL teams have had problems with that for years now (with dropping attendence numbers as a result). People watch the games on TV instead. You have to pay for that of course (at least if you want to do so legaly), but it's a lot cheaper than buying tickets for the games. And you get the road games too. And that's without considering that there might be more than one person in your household who want to watch the games. If you include that the difference start to become ridiculous.

Last year, for example, it was bad enough that Linköping decided to make an commercial that showed how much better it is to watch the games in the arena.

In fact, here is a link to it. It has it's moments. :P

https://www.facebook.com/LHCOfficialPage/videos/vb.194538404374/10153109764849375/?type=2&theater

This kind of probablem carries over to the CHL obviously. Not only is it still new and unfamiliar.... almost all of the games involving Swedish teams are on free to watch TV.
 
This organization deserves time. If I am not mistaken, there has not been a top international tournament in ice hockey in Europe. For example, you have Champions League in football, which teams would even die for. In basketball, Euroleague is regarded as the most prestigious and lucrative event. On the other hand, ice hockey itself differs from those sports simply by using a different format, even though it has similarities to basketball.

CHL is a baby step in creating this "most prestigious international event" hype and I hope it won't cease to exist in next few years before it's able to make the jump. I guess there will never be a competitive hockey team in my country for next 20 years but still, I can pretty much say that the interest in ice hockey increases even in here. In cities like Ankara, Izmir, Istanbul, Kocaeli and Erzurum, many children regularly skate and train ice hockey. Even in my little town, there are a few ice rinks which attracts people.

So, European ice hockey is a strong thing but not unified yet. If CHL insists on going forward, they will eventually do the job. Now, SHL fans only care about their league, rightly so. KHL fans are interested in KHL rankings and play-off, nothing more. This is because, there is nothing bigger than it, at the moment. When CHL establishes itself as a lucrative and prestigious tournament, things will change and people will look forward to see their teams play against opponents from other countries & leagues.

Implementations and changes should be made, though. I agree with this. A stable governing body should rank leagues and teams according to their success, maybe similar to what UEFA does in football with coefficient system.
 
I think the domestic leagues play too many games in order to get the supporters' interested in the tournament and the fact that they play the regular round during the pre season doesn't make it more serious.

Unfortunately, I believe the only way to get biggest group of people interested in this tournament is to decrease the amount of teams and games. Two groups of four teams including the champions of the KHL, SHL, Liiga, NLA, DEL and Extraliga, plus two teams winning some kind of qualification round to get the last spot in each group.
 
Exarz said:
I think the domestic leagues play too many games in order to get the supporters' interested in the tournament and the fact that they play the regular round during the pre season doesn't make it more serious.

Unfortunately, I believe the only way to get biggest group of people interested in this tournament is to decrease the amount of teams and games. Two groups of four teams including the champions of the KHL, SHL, Liiga, NLA, DEL and Extraliga, plus two teams winning some kind of qualification round to get the last spot in each group.
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Could be an idea.

Technically, it must be attractive that your team plays the best other european teams.

For the Swiss, the problem is that they do not prepare well enough in summer. They say they take the tournament seriously ... yet when you start preparing 1 or 2 weeks before the first game ... you can have as much will as you want when playing ... you will still be rusty. And the new players will not be integrated in the system.

This CHL is conceptually a good idea ... difficult to fine tune to achieve the result they achieved in soccer.
 
Reducing the number of games in domestic league is better imo, if we are speaking of improving CHL. There are too many of them.
 
hansomreiste said:
Reducing the number of games in domestic league is better imo, if we are speaking of improving CHL. There are too many of them.
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I doubt the teams would take a risk at lowering their income because of a tournament that they're uncertain of. And how are about 50 games too many?
 
Exarz said:
I doubt the teams would take a risk at lowering their income because of a tournament that they're uncertain of. And how are about 50 games too many?
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That's the right amount, it's the other leagues (like Liiga) that don't allow for a better schedule. Finnish fans have been saying for years that a 60 game regular season is too much, 50-55 would be much better.
 
stars33 said:
2. They have to get the KHL on board. I do not understand why the KHL would not want CSKA and St. Petersburg traveling around Europe. A Frolunda vs St. Petersburg would be an event. And this would take the CHL to another level. It would also create interest for the KHL if they could prove they are the best league.
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They dont have to prove anything. You could found a 33 players from KHL at Karjala cup in teams of Sweden(7), Finnland(12) and Czechs(14). Slovan is basically team Slovakkia minus Slovakian NHL players. So dont expect to KHL join IN.
 
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