WC: German and Swiss success
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My thought is that you certainly havent seen the rest of the games still have to played. Both Germany and Swiss played easier opponents in first 4 games, they have power houses still ahead while f. e. Finland played against USA, Canada and Slovakia which means they will most likely gather 9 points pretty easily.
I'm not saying that they don't have good teams, they certainly do and they are doing well I just want to put it in perspective.
stastny12
Registered User
Germany has a good team this year, not many top players are missing. A medal would be a distant dream, but so far they have been performing according to expectations rather than exceeding them. The roster is not worse than Slovakia's and even compared to Finland the gap is fairly small. So it's all normal.
I think the success lies in domestic leagues: look at Slovakia - their league is pathetic - therefore, a decline. Yes, they still have some NHL players and some KHL players, but the talent pool has been drained.
Germany and especially Swiss - have solid domestic leagues with a lot of solid ex-NHL/KHL talent and they are on the upswing.
Germany and especially Swiss - have solid domestic leagues with a lot of solid ex-NHL/KHL talent and they are on the upswing.
only4dank
Registered User
- May 4, 2016
- 66
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Fair enough, I do incline in the same direction. Germany did beat Slovakia though, and Swiss play Swedes today.
Mainly keeping this post as a placeholder because I see upsets to come (as has happened on the past few years, WC and U20,18 tournies). But this does seem like a trend, the huge upsets that is.
BruinLVGA
Just got me a Beretta 92XI Squalo!
Switzerland has stepped up the efforts in developing a strong youth movement and very professional national league in the past 25 years or so: that's the only valid foundation (in my opinion) to have a sustainable flow of talent.
It's not by chance that 25 years ago no Swiss players were drafted and in one generation time we managed to get a first overall and have kids regularly drafted and also coming over to play in NA junior leagues.
Two silver medals in the past 5 editions of the Worlds is a direct consequence of all this. Good, hard work & planning paying off.
The Zetterberg Era
Ball Hockey Sucks
I agree with this post, though the schedule has been favorable as well. Still I think both countries have made solid gains and that is because as you have outlined in my opinion they reap rewards from having solid leagues with some teams having solid payrolls and quality of competition.
BruinLVGA
Just got me a Beretta 92XI Squalo!
It's not the same situation as of today. Till the late 80s, top Swiss hockey players weren't even full-time pros. The only full-time pros were the 3 foreign players of each team.
I worked in a large company back then, who for example had many top athletes as part-timers (working 2-3 days a week). People who were Olympic athletes, for example: TOP athletes. Amongst them was Roberto Triulzi: 6 time Swiss champion (with HC Lugano and SC Bern) and 109 games played with the national team. He was in the IT department. The company would periodically make articles about the top athletes working for the company, in its trimestral internal magazine. I was in those articles too, by the way (not for hockey. Another team sport).
The mentality back then was that sports weren't legitimate job careers. It was frowned upon. That finally changed in the early 90s. It's not a chance that hockey has been on such a rise. The same has been the case for all other sports.
It was a seismic change in culture that made these things happen. Young people today don't know this, but I am old enough to remember those days.
Now everything is in place for the new generations to SERIOUSLY try to become top athletes.
slovakiasnextone
Registered User
Switzerland has made big strides in the last decade in regards to having top end talent. They used to have prospects, even some 1st rounders, but they weren't making it to the big league. That seems to have turned around now. They still have a long way to go to be near the top 6. Their u18 team was one loss against Slovakia away from getting relegated this year. Even if some posters on here see them as good or better than Czechs, they don't quiet have the depth the Czechs do.
German success is mainly thanks to great tactics on their part, but overall they are not on the same level as the Swiss.
German success is mainly thanks to great tactics on their part, but overall they are not on the same level as the Swiss.
As so often, it frequently comes down to money, and that's it. Germany and Switzerland are wealthy countries (among top 5 or top 10 in the world) – while, say, Slovakia is an impoverished, dilapidated post-Communist gubernia. Hard to produce anything of quality in such dire circumstances, not just hockey.
(If your counter-argument should be: well, Austria is just as wealthy as Switzerland and Germany, but not as successful in hockey – it's all a matter of focus and the sport's popularity. For Austria, alpine skiing is clear no. 1, football no. 2, and everything else far, far behind.)
(If your counter-argument should be: well, Austria is just as wealthy as Switzerland and Germany, but not as successful in hockey – it's all a matter of focus and the sport's popularity. For Austria, alpine skiing is clear no. 1, football no. 2, and everything else far, far behind.)
