I'm pretty fine with the concept of having Europe and NA again. If it bothers people, fine, that's their opinion and right. But it sure doesn't bother me. Watching Team Europe this touranment, I like the concept even more. Players who's biggest achievement on international stage would be making the quarter-finals, players who, for example, never beat Sweden before, but now they did together. I like it, and especially if the NHL goes to the Olympics, why not have this format? You have the olympics for the only nationalistic people and purpose, and you have here another unique tournament, that would sure get to be more prestigous with being held more regularly.
The North American team was a great idea, and it could be next time around too, if they give the right to choose first to Canada/US. If someone thinks there won't be enough talent around like this year... I don't think so. Maybe there won't be McDavid or Matthews, but there will be plenty of talent for sure.
Hockey is about enjoynment. Of course, I like enjoying serious competition, so if I knew players are holding back and not playing their best, I wouldn't like the format anymore, but that's not the case. The games that included North America were one of the best I've ever seen.
As for changing the format to Canada A + Canada B, or something like that, I don't think it's a good idea. You want the tournament to maintain a certain look, you can't change format everytime. There's only two options in my opinion. Either you get back to traditional format with countries only, whatever the qualification system for the lesser teams is, or you remain with this year's format, changing only the rule of availability for the NAU24 team.
I understand people who are into nation-vs-nation competition only. I get it, and that's why I love the Olympics, or the World Championships. But
if the players find the format interesting and worthy of putting their best effort on the line, I don't see what is wrong with having something different, unique from other /competition. It brings excitement and that's what it's about for me.
Some people go around here (and look really stupid right now if they still do so), and say... "well, yeah, it's fun, the game is fun, but it's not serious, it's not really intense.... well... try to watch a game, without prejudice and really tell me where do you see the difference between an olympic game, and a world cup game, because I can't see any. If it's in you head, and you come to this tournament thinking it's a bull of crap, then it's natural that your mind is trying to see it in that way, that's just how brain works. If you are going to be positive about life, you will see positive things, if you choose to be negative, your mind will see negative things, that's just how it is. And if you choose to think this tournament is bull of crap, well, guess what. You will see what you want to see. Have you ever met a person in life who complained about something that wasn't even really there? Who you knew majority of people feel different, but he's somehow "negative" and sees things in different light? Have you?
Now I'm not talking about people who think that because it's not "real best-on-best" (because Canada and US were not able to pick the players from Team NAU24), or because there's Team Europe and Team NA, "gimmick teams" in supposed national competition, which doesn't make sense, and therefore it's a meaningless tournament. I don't talk about those people. You can see that the tournament is meaningless for them because of these reasons, no matter how players care or don't care about the tournament, no matter how intense the play is or isn't. I'm talking about people who question the intensity and interest of players on the ice. I'm talking about people who think that this tournament isn't taken seriously by the players and it's "showing up", (somwhere?) Look, if your only argument is that "this is not the olympics", well, nothing is. So if you think an athlete doesn't take seriously any other pro-competition other than the olympics, I don't know what to tell you. I guess all the World Athletics and gymnastics and swimming championships don't matter to the athletes becauase it's not the olympics, right? Obviously, the last argument is that they don't really care because the format sucks. (like I've heard from swedish, finnish fans, for example). So, I'm talking about
these people, just to make it clear. Now:
I am quite confident, that if I showed someone, who doesn't know what games he's watching, a game from the 2010 Olympics, and a game from this World cup, I'm quite confident he wouldn't notice any difference in pace, tempo, effort passion, or emotions. So, how's that, here according to these people players supposedly and "celarly" don't really care?
Look at this game
and then at this game, and tell me the difference. I'm waiting for it, because there must be something to point out if you think the difference is obvious and is seen in the actual game (well, where else right)
or this game
and this game
I watched a couple of plays from those videos, and where is the difference some people talk about? Some are complaining there's no big hits, no huge hitting...look at the quarter final game in Vancouver between Sweden and Slovakia (or Russia and Slovakia)...I watched a couple of minutes and guess what...no real hitting..anything big, just standard battles like here. I guess players were not going serious, eh? It wasn't intense, eh?
There is one thing people forget here, the european teams just don't play physical hockey really. Where is the last time you saw Russia playing like a real physical game? Or game where they finish every play and check every player? Or Sweden? Not even Canada played overly physically at the 2015 world championships, which they won, and there was whole summer in front of them, not a new nhl season they need to be ready for. Yeah, they played hard for a few minutes if they needed to, as well as they did against Russia or US or Europe at this tournament when they needed to. People just forget that teams like Russia or Sweden, or even Team Europe, just don't have that type of players. Who do you expect to play "hard" on team Russia? Ovechkin? Yeah, he played hard and was throwing a lot of hits. Who's next? Malkin? Yeah, I'm not sure really. Kuznetsov? Panarin? Datsyuk? And what about Team Europe? What players play, like on the edge in the NHL? Chara perhaps. And? Zuccarello? (And to his credit, even he was trying really hard and almost trew some hits in the first final), or F.Nielsen? Hossa? Draisaitl? Tatar? Vanek? Those are all skilled player first.
Whereas team USA played A LOT physically. Why? They had the players for it. Dubinsky, Abdelkader, Kesler, Backes, Byfuglien, J.Johnson, and others. They were really playing intense and hard on the boards. Some people complain and say that Team Canada isn't really playing hard, etc.. they can play hard if they need to. You saw that when they were challanged by the US. Or when Russia turned the game from 0-1 to 2-1. Canada turned their game on. Or when Doughty crushed Nielsen the other day here when Europe was pushing in the third. But this team is just too good to chase someone on the ice. The other thing is you don't really need to play physically if your opponent isn't playing that way AND on top of that you control the play.
On the other hand, there is this team called North America, who showed plenty of emotions and wasn't scared to play hard.
Here's the US-Canada game in the group stage: look at 1:42:00
no intensity, eh?
and, of course then there is the denial of when some player says something like Zdeno Chara just said here after the First final:
“It doesn’t matter what age you are. I think you have to appreciate the game. If you’re not going to appreciate the game, the game’s not going to be appreciating you so you really have to be taking it with a great appreciation and being humble,” Chara said. “I think everybody no matter who you ask is probably happy to be playing at this level and at this time of whoever’s career it is, or whatever the point is.”
“It has been great. To be honest with you, it really exceeded my expectations as far as how it’s all going to play out, how it’s all going to turn out. I’m really enjoying myself,” Chara said. “I have great passion for this game. I love hockey, I love competing and I love playing against the best. This tournament has been probably the most competitive tournament of all time. We have the best teams, best players at the start of the season where everybody is healthy, nobody is in the playoffs, nobody is really tired from the whole season.”
http://sports.yahoo.com/news/zdeno-chara-goes-all-in-for-team-europe-at-world-cup-174856956.html
