Let's Watch... Czechoslovakia vs USSR (1969/3/21)

[Theokritos]

The first of two encounters at the 1969 World Championship in Sweden. The image quality is top-notch.



Line-ups:

Spoiler

Czechoslovakia (blue):
Dzurilla (1); Horešovský (3) - Suchý (17), Pospíšil (7) - Machač (4), Bednář (6); Černý (15) - Golonka (9) - Ševčík (8), Jiří Holík (20) - Jaroslav Holík (5) - Hrbatý (10), Augusta (12) - Nedomanský (14) - Klapáč (11), Havel (21).

USSR (white):
Zinger (1); Romishevsky (3) - Davydov (2), Lutchenko (6) - Ragulin (5), Paladyev (7); Alexander Yakushev (19) - Starshinov (8) - Zimin (17), Firsov (11) - Maltsev (18) - Vikulov (9), Kharlamov (12) - Petrov (16) - Mikhailov (13), Mishakov (10).

Click to read more...

 

[Overrated]

With Czech commentary. Might seem redundant but whatever.


I can say one thing with certainty though after watching the last WC in the past few days where they seemed to narrow the rink all the way to the NHL standards which is that wide > narrow rink. Subjective opinion of course.

 

[JackSlater]

Nice quality, several players I am interested in getting eyes on. I will be watching this tonight or tomorrow.

 

[Sentinel]

This was the world championship where many Soviet citizens rooted for CSSR. My parents did.

 

[Theokritos]

Yevgeni Paladyev (#7) vs Josef Černý 1969:



Yevgeni Paladyev (#26) vs Pete Mahovlich 1972:

 

[JackSlater]

Video quality is great, but not remotely an aesthetically pleasing game. Czechs dictated the terms in that regard. Nice to see Firsov again, I've seen him play better in my limited viewings but he still stands out here.

 

[Theokritos]

This game features the rarest of occurances: the Soviet national team being held scoreless. I think the last time that had happened was in 1955. Just a great defensive performance by the Czechoslovaks. Their forwards all bought in and were very disciplined on the backcheck throughout the entire game, giving the Soviets little to work with.

Jan Suchý is the standout for me. He kills so many Soviet plays and starts so many Czechoslovak plays. In the defensive end, at the offensive blue line, wherever. He is just roaming around and always seems to be in the right place. No wonder he was widely considered the best player in Europe that season.

 

[alko]

Now we couldn't imagine the background with this games. All people in Czechoslovakia watched this. According to my parents, it was insane that time... Cant be compared to anything else.

You had this 72 Summer Slam (Summit Series) but with all respect, this games were above that. Not saying in hockey quality, but in all this things around it.

 

[DN28]

It took me a lot of time to fully realize the political implications of the two CSSR vs. USSR games of the 1969 Championship. Both games led to protests against the Soviet occupation. The one riot in particular happened in Prague at night after the second Czechoslovak-Soviet match (4:3) which led people to throw cobblestones onto the Soviet Aeroflot office in the Prague centre.

This happened through the last 2 weeks of March. Alexander Dubček, the assumed head of reform movement, was ousted of all of his positions in April. This was the final nail in the coffin to the 1960s effort to democratic reforms in Czechoslovakia. The hockey games directly influence domestic CSSR politics for many years.

In fact, there is even a wiki article about this: Czechoslovak Hockey Riots.

On this topic, one of the more known Czechoslovak spies of the Cold War era, Josef Frolík, suggested later in his memoirs that the communists used the outcome of the games to their purposes. According to Frolík, one of the heads of the STB before the March 28 evening said: "You know, a little provocation like this will be enough now... It won't take anything big, maybe just tear apart a Soviet book or Aeroflot, and then you'll see how this all gets squeezed."

The game itself is pretty good too. Despite the low score you can see the intensity and focus of every player involved.

 

[Orange Dragon]

which led people to throw cobblestones onto the Soviet Aeroflot office in the Prague centre.

This was likely a StB provocation to justify further repressions against Czechoslovak citizens.

 

[Overrated]

Nedomansky is very underrated. 38 goals in the NHL at 33/34 on a bottom tier team. Extremely strong internationally in his earlier days. Ranked #169 on here. He will likely go up in ranking in the future.

 

[Uncle Rotter]

When did Czechoslovakia switch from blue to red jerseys?

 

[Theokritos]

When did Czechoslovakia switch from blue to red jerseys?

From the footage on YouTube it looks like they switched after the 1972-1973 season.

 

[DN28]

Yeah, the Czechoslovakia stopped wearing the blue uniforms after 1973, except for some junior teams.

U-20 CSSR national teams wore the blue up to late 70s, I think.

 

[jigglysquishy]

I love the clean white ice like this, especially with the high quality footage.

Suchy is such a standout for CSSR. Between 5:30 and 6:30 in the video he makes a shot, smart pass to the slot, and rushes back to stop a Soviet.

The 5 on 3 (at 1:00:00) that leads to the first goal is interesting. The Czechs just dominate, but Suchy is everywhere on the ice and gets 3 shots off before scoring.

Overall, he plays great. But he's also prone to doing too much on the play when the pass is available. 1:22:45 is a good example of him causing an own-turnover. He lucked into it being offside.

Huge hit on the Soviet goalie (Zinger?) at 1:23:45. There's bad blood on the ice.

Suchy clears the zone and has a great outlet pass leading to the goal at 1:28:15. Cerny has a great deke leading to the goal.

 

[MeHateHe]

This was the world championship where many Soviet citizens rooted for CSSR. My parents did.

Why is that?

 

[Overrated]

Why is that?

The Soviet invasion of CSSR of 1968.

 

[VanIslander]

The Czechs and Slovaks together beat the **** out of the Soviets prior to the plane crash way back then. Google it.