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WC: 2018 Division I, II, III

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SoundAndFury said:
Bad things:

1. Italy being promoted the way they were.
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What do you mean by that?

I don't like the direction of hockey in D1A, with everybody acquiring NA players to play for them... so I'm glad Lithuania made it.

Edit: About Puskarich... I don't think that he could help, he's pretty bad and the fact that he was playing over Simšič was pretty annoying for me. (on Medveščak roster)
 
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HungryFrank said:
What do you mean by that?

I don't like the direction of hockey in D1A, with everybody acquiring NA players to play for them... so I'm glad Lithuania made it.

Edit: About Puskarich... I don't think that he could help, he's pretty bad and the fact that he was playing over Simšič was pretty annoying for me. (on Medveščak roster)
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I mean they got promoted because Slovenia was forced to pull a goalie.

And while Puskarich isn't great by EBEL's standards, he is for sure better than what Croatia has been icing now.
 
Pageau Rouge said:
Rinks aren't a problem. Look at a country like Slovenia with their tiny amount of rinks and ability to play in the Olympics. The problem is the EIHA and its commitment to things like rec and uni hockey, and the rinks desire to take them because they can make more money from it. Basically junior hockey needs subsidising to let the kids have more hours on the ice, and not at stupid times of the day. Basically we need a federation to do its job (e.g. getting a national team sponsor even when the team is on free-to-air tv).
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Tiny countries aren't attempting to build self-sufficient hockey pyramids from top to bottom. There's no pro league in Slovenia and there's no pro league in Latvia either. Latvia has been a part of the Elite tier for 21 years in a row now, and the reason is counter-intuitive. Our leading players leave early, because it simply is impossible to create a competitive junior league or a high quality pro league with such a limited amount of players and resources. Marinating talented 15-18 year olds in a mediocre hockey system will not produce any major pro players. That is why bigger nations like Poland, UK, also France are caught in this trap of mediocrity.
 
^That is very true, leaving early is essential. Parents not letting the child go play abroad are killing his pro hockey hopes, more or less. Even if they wish their child the best thinking he's better off eating that healthy momma's cooked food.
 
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Namejs said:
Tiny countries aren't attempting to build self-sufficient hockey pyramids from top to bottom. There's no pro league in Slovenia and there's no pro league in Latvia either. Latvia has been a part of the Elite tier for 21 years in a row now, and the reason is counter-intuitive. Our leading players leave early, because it simply is impossible to create a competitive junior league or a high quality pro league with such a limited amount of players and resources. Marinating talented 15-18 year olds in a mediocre hockey system will not produce any major pro players. That is why bigger nations like Poland, UK, also France are caught in this trap of mediocrity.
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The point is that we need kids at ages 5-12 playing as much as they can here, before then leaving to play in higher junior leagues. We have guys like Howlett and Duggan in Finland and Sweden respectively, but I do agree.
 
SoundAndFury said:
3. Croatia getting eliminated will definitely another naturalization wave. Guys like Aviani and Puskarich will be there in the D2A next year already but there has to be more to come.
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Which means absolutely nothing. Six years ago in D2A we have had Joel Prpic, Andy Sertich and Kenneth MacAulay, all much more influential players in EBEL than Aviani and Puskarich and we managed to lose against Spain.

To be honest I am eagerly waiting for Medveščak to be forced to pull out from EBEL. I am sick of them and their "naturalization" plans and everything. They are Goebels like liars.
 
Division I Group A
Great Britain and Italy are promoted to the 2019 IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship
Poland is relegated to the 2019 IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship Division I Group B
Division I Group B
Lithuania is promoted to the 2019 IIHF Ice Hockey Men World Championship Division I Group A
Croatia is relegated to the 2019 IIHF Ice Hockey Men World Championship Division II Group A
Division II Group A
Netherlands is promoted to the 2019 IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship Division I Group B
Iceland is relegated to the 2019 IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship Division II Group B
Division II Group B
Spain is promoted to the 2019 IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship Division II Group A
Luxembourg is relegated to the 2019 IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship Division III
Division III
Georgia is promoted to the 2019 IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship Division II Group B
Hong Kong has been relegated to the 2019 IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship Division III Qualification
Division III qualification
Turkmenistan is promoted to the 2019 IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship Division III
 
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What a nice atmosphere over in Division I, I had no idea. I'm aware that Hungary was the home team but still really cool to see.

 
Finland is 0-2 all-time against GB I believe. Hopefully we finally get a chance to get that first win.
 
Oh wow...watching that sequence. Hungary will replay that minute in their minds many times...so many opportunities to clear the puck....and then a bad angle shot at the feet gets thorough Vay.

The Hungary gets a late look off a pretty poor rebound....

Makes it all even more amazing.
 
BMann said:
Namely a lack of rinks. They don't need to be huge just enough to accommodate 1-2000 people. Get more kids skating there and see who has talent for the sport. Bring in the right coaches as currently the coaching standards in GB are low and juniors will suffer as a result. That requires money and somehow IHUK needs to get that funding going with the help of GB Sport and the private sector. And a return of rinks in areas where there was a traditional hockey presence like Durham, Streatham and Wembley. At a certain age 13-14 get the best kids scholarships to go abroad to play and study or set up more schemes like the Okanagan Academy within the UK. And a restoration of the second tier of British hockey which currently is in a worryingly poor state. Not to mention a limit on imports which unfortunately has been increased. It is all well and good having skilled imports from which juniors can learn but as in football please don't import journeymen for the sake of it instead of giving the spot to a young British player who has talent and ability.
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Unfortunately most of this won't happen. Ice hockey is stuck in the perpetual cycle of not being able to get funding because they don't meet the participation targets of organisations like Sport England, which is impossible to do so due to the number of rinks and ice time available, but we won't get any more rinks because they won't give us funding, so it's a never ending cycle. Another sad reality is, and it's sounds horrible to say, but a lot of the time they're only interested in increasing participation for underrepresented groups such as women and the disabled. I remember a few years ago there was a guy in the British ice hockey community involved in sports governance somehow, going round saying in order to get funding clubs had to show it was for people aged 16-25 and everyone who knows anything told him sorry but to actually improve the sport you've got to target children at a much earlier age, but 16-25 was their box-ticking age range.

That's the participation problem, the other problem is they'll only give funding at the elite level if there's a realistic chance of a medal, unfortunately ice hockey is a team sport that other countries actually care about. It's much easier to chuck money at an obscure individual sport with very low participation, you can just get somebody who is a naturally good athlete and teach them how to ride a bit of metal down a slide for no other reason than it will look good on the medals table and for some arbitrary jingoistic reasons, the tangible benefits are extremely minimual. I think it's sad that they waste so much money on this rubbish when if used on ice hockey it would actually benefit the tens of thousands of people who play and watch every week, rather than just a few elite athletes. I don't think there is even a skeleton track in this country, but we win Olympic medals in it because they pinpointed it as an easy one to achieve and threw loads of money at a couple of people.
 
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I asked this earlier.

How do you Brits realistically hope to fare?

Are we talking double digit losses here? Could you come to play against teams that are not top 6?

I ask, since I have no clue on the level of the UK team.
 
AstrophysicalJet said:
I asked this earlier.

How do you Brits realistically hope to fare?

Are we talking double digit losses here? Could you come to play against teams that are not top 6?

I ask, since I have no clue on the level of the UK team.
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GB kept the score respectable against Latvia and gave France a good game in Olympic qualifiers for Sochi. The team has come along a lot since then. They played 2 friendlies against Norway last year and didn't get blown away despite splitting the squad giving everyone a look, mixing team GB regulars with guys who barely get a sniff at making the final roster. I don't know if Norway brought a full strength team but in the game I watched in Cardiff GB lost 5-2, I don't think GB had any forwards who were in the team this year, and they played the backup and third choice goalies half the game each, only a few of the D were in this year's team.

I expect South Korea's results this year will be a reasonable indicator.
 
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Team GB is surley not any weaker (or any better) than the other teams who get promoted. And we rarley see double-digit losses. So with all guys around and a solid gameplan they can challenge the other teams who are just in front in the World ranking. For staying in the top-division it nees a little bit more though.
 
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Hubie said:
Finland is 0-2 all-time against GB I believe. Hopefully we finally get a chance to get that first win.
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Haha. True. That's from totally different cycles of Cronos of hockey.

We were formally at War with The Great Britain until Paris Peace Treaty signed 10 February 1947...

1951 Canadian Finnish community sent Kanada-malja to be The trophy awarded to Finnish league champions...

Some 7 years later Team Canada still used Team Finland like cheap arsewipe with result 24-0...

7 more years and we finally built our first indoor rink...

After further 23 years of struggle we finally managed to get our first olympic medal in hockey...

Time fly!

Go Britain Go! :)
 
Going to be fun to see Great Britian at the main level next year, first time since the 90's I believe.
 
1994 Great Britain played in Italy. Scored 9 goals in 6 games and recieved 49. Closest games were 2-5 to Norway and 0-4 to Germany.
 
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