Toggle sidebar

Germany to the finals!

  • Xenforo Cloud will be upgrading us to version 2.3.5 on March 3rd at 12 AM GMT. This version has increased stability and fixes several bugs. We expect downtime for the duration of the update. The admin team will continue to work on existing issues, templates and upgrade all necessary available addons to minimize impact of this new version. Click Here for Updates
Hockey in Germany is fighting with basketball and handball for that 2nd spot as team sports go..but all of them are like a million miles behind soccer. You can go through life in Germany just fine without ever paying attention to hockey, basketball or handball but soccer will infiltrate your life whether you like it or not.

The real problem of hockey in Germany though isn't lack of interest in terms of watching the games, it's lack of players and infrastructure to support players. There aren't many rinks, there aren't that many teams and yes there aren't that many parents sending their kids to those teams.
 
  • Like
Reactions: TorstenFrings, NYRFANMANI and Frannel
TheMoreYouKnow said:
Hockey in Germany is fighting with basketball and handball for that 2nd spot as team sports go..but all of them are like a million miles behind soccer. You can go through life in Germany just fine without ever paying attention to hockey, basketball or handball but soccer will infiltrate your life whether you like it or not.

The real problem of hockey in Germany though isn't lack of interest in terms of watching the games, it's lack of players and infrastructure to support players. There aren't many rinks, there aren't that many teams and yes there aren't that many parents sending their kids to those teams.
Click to expand...

To the heart of it!
 
  • Like
Reactions: NYRFANMANI
TheMoreYouKnow said:
Hockey in Germany is fighting with basketball and handball for that 2nd spot as team sports go..but all of them are like a million miles behind soccer. You can go through life in Germany just fine without ever paying attention to hockey, basketball or handball but soccer will infiltrate your life whether you like it or not.

The real problem of hockey in Germany though isn't lack of interest in terms of watching the games, it's lack of players and infrastructure to support players. There aren't many rinks, there aren't that many teams and yes there aren't that many parents sending their kids to those teams.
Click to expand...

You are right. My mother watched some parts of the game vs. Canada. The commentator called for mothers to send their children to hockey Clubs.
My mother told me I saw the teeth of those guys, would never send my children there. Think thats typically for hockey in Germany, beside some parts of Bavaria. Parents rather let their children do other sports.
 
Last edited:
Bure80 said:
You are right. My mother watched some parts of the game vs. Canada. The commentator called for mothers to send their children to hockey Clubs.
My mother told me I saw the teeth of those guys, would never send my children there. Think thats typically for hockey in Germany, beside some parts of Bavaria. Parents rather let their children do other sports.
Click to expand...

This one right here is a proud mini-hockey-player mum! He started this year and loves the sport. If he sticks with it - perfect. If he doesn't: I can't make him!
 
Congrats to Germany and their fans! I never would have picked them to play in the Gold Medal game. Good luck!

I expected Russia and Canada to be in the medals, along with Sweden.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Frannel
I can't be the only one getting a kick out of certain media outlets and casual fans calling this "bigger than the Miracle on Ice"....

I'm just trying to figure out who the equivalent of Tretiak on this Canadian team is.
Vladislav Scrivens has a good ring to it!
 
EA and Amazon are allready benefitting from Team Germany's success. Sales of NHL 18 on Xbox One went up by 680% on the day of the semifinal :laugh:

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DWx5oH7WAAAEqVI.jpg
DWx5oH7WAAAEqVI.jpg
 
  • Like
Reactions: NyQuil
Big kudos to the German team for making this far in the tournament. This gritty team will certainly put Russia to the test. But I am still wondering why Germany hasn't produced a lot of NHL-caliber players. It's a very rich country with a tremendous history of success in different sporting disciplines, but hockey development has hit a plateau.
 
Firsov99 said:
Big kudos to the German team for making this far in the tournament. This gritty team will certainly put Russia to the test. But I am still wondering why Germany hasn't produced a lot of NHL-caliber players. It's a very rich country with a tremendous history of success in different sporting disciplines, but hockey development has hit a plateau.
Click to expand...

Youth development is atrocious. Young players who are dead serious on making it into the NHL have to uproot their life and move to Canada or the States. Germany is a bandwagon nation that only supports successful teams/people and so if there isn't anything to cheer for, nobody cares. Nobody cares = nobody wants to watch it on TV, nobody wants to watch it on TV mean less TV money = less TV revenue. Less TV exposure, less sponsors, less sponsors = less money overall.

Sure, I'm exaggerating a bit when I say "nobody cares" , but in simplistic terms this is the problem. When you are competing with a sport like Handball and a pastime like Darts, you know you aren't exactly laid on a bed of roses.
 
IamNotADancer said:
Youth development is atrocious. Young players who are dead serious on making it into the NHL have to uproot their life and move to Canada or the States. Germany is a bandwagon nation that only supports successful teams/people and so if there isn't anything to cheer for, nobody cares. Nobody cares = nobody wants to watch it on TV, nobody wants to watch it on TV mean less TV money = less TV revenue. Less TV exposure, less sponsors, less sponsors = less money overall.

Sure, I'm exaggerating a bit when I say "nobody cares" , but in simplistic terms this is the problem. When you are competing with a sport like Handball and a pastime like Darts, you know you aren't exactly laid on a bed of roses.
Click to expand...

It's kind of sad. I think that Germany could have become a hockey powerhouse if it wanted to.
 
Firsov99 said:
It's kind of sad. I think that Germany could have become a hockey powerhouse if it wanted to.
Click to expand...

Absolutely agree. I've said it somewhere else on the board, if Germany figured out a way to pump in some serious money into youth development AND coaching clinics they would easily rival Sweden, Finland and the Czech Republic, I have no doubt about that. But on a broader basis the problem here is soccer's popularity. It has a stranglehold on pretty much every other sport in the country, so much so that every other sport is a fringe sport.
 
Ducks76 said:
Underdog? Then you must support Russia! ;) ;) ;)!
Click to expand...
Let's not go over our heads here.;) But I'm impressed by the German team, and as Germany is one of my favorite countries outside Sweden I'm also happy for them. Hope they can build on this for the future.
 
Bitter to lose a game that was theirs to win, but then already that's more than anyone could expect or even really believe in. Hopefully there will be another chance some day, maybe after that experience it won't be decided by poor discipline. A great tournament and a fantastic silver regardless.
 
Congrats, Germany and Marco Sturm! This was a good team there. If Sturm gets Drai for the WHC watch out.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Latest posts

Ad

Upcoming events

Ad

Top Bottom