I wouldn‘t have selected Simon Meier aswell but i don‘t think he‘ll be cut since he‘s a returnee and played alright last year
I'm not sure I agree, they are lacking elite talent. Having 2-3 difference makers, a PP QB, etc., can be crucial at this level. Some key pieces are missing to make a deeper play-off run. They are very deep, though. Actually, the one thing that seems perplexing to me is how they can afford to play a guy like Reber on the 3rd line, it would seem that he would be best employed in the top 6.
Yeah, surely I'm not arguing about the deeper run potential, more like you expect games against Slovenia and Czechia to be somewhat tight. It felt like in recent tournaments they would only come to win one game.
Slovenia won't be there. In case you mean Slovakia...those games have always been tight. Slovakia has become Switzerland's arch rival at WJC's. I don't recall many loopsided affairs either way. Games are always close nail biters. Recently we've seen lots lots of close games vs better teams, too. Just look at last year's WJC20 out. Beglieri played his heart out only to get scammed by the refs in OT where they missed a blatant Swedish trip only to call a highly questionable, controversial penalty vs Dionicio. Yeah, the game was only close thanks to Beglieri but Switzerland honestly should have won.
Be that as it may, do you think this year's team is better than last's?
Yeah this swiss team looks very good for your standards which is funny, since the 05 birth year was quite weak during their U18 times.
He is also not better than the guys in Biel, wjc20 and NL are both valuable experiences for him when given enough ice time.
Yes, there's no more Dionicio. Yes Muggli and Ustinkov don't appear to have made a lot of progress but the latter at least played well in international games this season. Also, this year's defensemen are gonna have much more offensive upside than last year's. Last year it was really just the Terraneo/Dionicio duo creating offense from the back end. Even if Muggli/Ustinkov end up disappointing or not making the cut you still have lots of potential on the back end. It's gonna have do be done by committee but Balestra, G.Meier, Schneller and Johnson are all dynamic defensemen able to make plays.
I am not denying what you are saying and I think that the d corps is better overall than last year. But sometimes a hyper dynamic player i just more valuable than several dynamic ones. Especially at this tournament. Last year when the team needed offense they just gave the puck to Dionicio and the latter could create almost always something for them. That element just seems to be lacking for this years team. And you cant really compensate that with depth alone.
Yeah and definitley better than 01,02,03 aswell in their year. 2000‘s were good so the team this year needs to play really well to surpass that
Yeah that‘s true. Most players play NL now which is of course a lot better than the u20 elit where our guys were playing back in 2023. And they 06 birth year is very strong aswell with 07 Steiner who improved a lot this year.
That‘s true for me Lars Steiner has the potential to be that but maybe not this year. Most of our pro experienced or drafted players are strong two way players but not flashy high end players, even Muggli as a second round player. The game against canada was a lot closer than score suggests but our Goalies were weak and our team can‘t compensate bad goalies with offense as you stated. Our hope should be to play with our high pace, and avoid getting scored on. If we score 2-3 goals per game we should be fine. The D corps from this year should be better than all the ones from 2021-2024 except maybe 2023 with Bichsel but besides him it wasn‘t that good.
