WC: Quarter Finals!

[swissexpert]

Of course it’s important. It’s completely absurd not to acknowledge it. It’s like having a football World Cup where Brazil brings their best players and Germany players from the second Bundesliga.

Yeah the thing is, Germany in that case should ask themselves why the Bundesliga players declined, and not constantly bring up that they have their C-roster because it's kinda annoying and simply doesn't matter.

If you team loses, it's because the opponent was better and not because of a player sitting at home.

Of course you could call our team an A-roster but with some research, you would find out that Josi, Suter, Schmid, Meier, Kurashev, Andrighetto, Hoffmann etc. are all not here.

 

[jj cale]

Every fan base does do it to an extent, but you have to admit Canadians do tend to do it (quite a bit) more. And to be fair, roster-wise, Canadians also tend to have more of a reason given that generally many more of the top players from Canada are missing than from European teams, so I get why the competition does not mean that much to most Canadians. For Europeans, despite the obvious issue with each country’s roster in any given year, the tournament is still a big event every year, it’s a party, we really enjoy it and it means something to us. There is comparatively little interest in this tournament in Canada. The tournament has a very long tradition and huge rivalries in Europe, and before the fall of the iron curtain, most European nations’ top players participated in the world championships because they didn’t play in the NHL. Only Canada and the US for understandable reasons sent below par teams. So the tournament has a lot of significance in Europe and I look forward to it every year! Doesn’t negate the actual point about the rosters though – there is a reason why suddenly Switzerland is an overwhelming gold favorite, and it’s not because their prowess suddenly dwarfs that of the traditional top nations.

Every fan base has a segment that complains or makes excuses, look at how Slovak fans reacted to the Swiss sitting out all those players yesterday or check out the Sweden-us gdt thread from yesterday to see the howling from some Swedish fans on the knee on knee fiasco and the reffing. I could give you a million more examples.

I just don't understand this fixation some fans have with............" only Canadian fans do it" or."Canadian fans do it worse"

I mean cmon guys........................you're all smart enough to know that's just not true.

 

[Old Man Jags]

It's the nature of this tournament to have a yearly fluxuation on roster paper strength, not sure why anyone is more annoyed by it this year, anymore than any other year.

I don’t think it’s annoyance. I am not annoyed by the strength of the Swiss team and I have sensed zero hostility to them here, they’re a great team, their players were patriotic enough to come and play for their national side, and if they win gold I would be really happy for them, as would clearly be many ! I just think that maybe it’s more in your face this year that the roster strength makes the difference because Switzerland is the gold favorite. Switzerland normally never is the gold favorites – no matter what the relative roster strengths are, it is pretty much always the traditional top nations that end up contesting all semifinals. And on the rare occasion someone else sneaks in, it is a massive surprise. The roster strength this year is such that Switzerland not only was favorite on paper before the tournament started, but have also completely justified it with their performances. If instead of Switzerland the Swedish team was unusually stacked this year, the whole roster thing may be less on the nose because Sweden is always one of the favorites anyway. Also, from a Czech perspective, the huge list of players who couldn’t come because they were injured or got injured just before the tournament or got injured at the tournament, all of whom being the top players rather than players we would be OK to lose, I guess drove it home a little bit more for some Czech fans as it’s been really on the nose. Very jinxed tournament injury-wise.

 

[swissexpert]

I literally said that Swiss are favourites. I was specifically questioning the odds for sports betting. Swiss seems like unreasonable high favs in this match to me.

According to them, Swiss are higher favs to win than Bruins at home vs Blackhawks.

Yes I know, but I was trying to give you some reasons why the odds are there. It's been a bit more than puck luck between those two teams I think.

We have GER to advance at 3,50 right now, meaning if this exact game is played 7 times, GER will win 2 and SUI 5 times.
Doesn't seem off to me. Of course, GER can win this game and it wouldn't be a huge surprise, but this is exactly what the odds say as well.

 

[Old Man Jags]

Yeah the thing is, Germany in that case should ask themselves why the Bundesliga players declined, and not constantly bring up that they have their C-roster because it's kinda annoying and simply doesn't matter.

If you team loses, it's because the opponent was better and not because of a player sitting at home.

Of course you could call our team an A-roster but with some research, you would find out that Josi, Suter, Schmid, Meier, Kurashev, Andrighetto, Hoffmann etc. are all not here.

On the day, you will win or lose because you have the better team or the worse team on the ice, but the issue really is about calling it “world championships”. I prefer “the Skodas”, as it is often called here. It’s a tournament we all love, I would be happy for the Swiss to win it this year as they are simply the best team at the tournament, it just feels odd referring to the winner as the “world champions” when all the best players of the top nations are in the NHL which continues to play. By the way, Czech players actually do tend to want to play for the national team with few exceptions like Zacha. When the best players do not play it’s usually simply because they are injured or their NHL teams are still in the Stanley Cup or they are out of contract at the time. But that’s beside the point. Anyway, no need to continue arguing about this, nobody will begrudge Switzerland the gold, and many neutrals will be actively pleased for them!

 

[jj cale]

I don’t think it’s annoyance. I am not annoyed by the strength of the Swiss team and I have sensed zero hostility to them here, they’re a great team, their players were patriotic enough to come and play for their national side, and if they win gold I would be really happy for them, as would clearly be many ! I just think that maybe it’s more in your face this year that the roster strength makes the difference because Switzerland is the gold favorite. Switzerland normally never is the gold favorites – no matter what the relative roster strengths are, it is pretty much always the traditional top nations that end up contesting all semifinals. And on the rare occasion someone else sneaks in, it is a massive surprise. The roster strength this year is such that Switzerland not only was favorite on paper before the tournament started, but have also completely justified it with their performances. If instead of Switzerland the Swedish team was unusually stacked this year, the whole roster thing may be less on the nose because Sweden is always one of the favorites anyway. Also, from a Czech perspective, the huge list of players who couldn’t come because they were injured or got injured just before the tournament or got injured at the tournament, all of whom being the top players rather than players we would be OK to lose, I guess drove it home a little bit more for some Czech fans as it’s been really on the nose. Very jinxed tournament injury-wise.

I understand the frustration, I mean................look at Canada's roster.

It is what it is, as fans we just have to accept it and cheer on our guys, the guys who came.


They deserve our support, they have chosen to come and represent us here, the players that didn't come well............that's their loss

 

[Old Man Jags]

I understand the frustration, I mean................look at Canada's roster.

It is what it is, as fans we just have to accept it and cheer on our guys, the guys who came.


They deserve our support, they have chosen to come and represent us here, the players that didn't come well............that's their loss

Yes, I completely agree.

 

[swissexpert]

On the day, you will win or lose because you have the better team or the worse team on the ice, but the issue really is about calling it “world championships”. I prefer “the Skodas”, as it is often called here. It’s a tournament we all love, I would be happy for the Swiss to win it this year as they are simply the best team at the tournament, it just feels odd referring to the winner as the “world champions” when all the best players of the top nations are in the NHL which continues to play. By the way, Czech players actually do tend to want to play for the national team with few exceptions like Zacha. When the best players do not play it’s usually simply because they are injured or their NHL teams are still in the Stanley Cup or they are out of contract at the time. But that’s beside the point. Anyway, no need to continue arguing about this, nobody will begrudge Switzerland the gold, and many neutrals will be actively pleased for them!

Agreed completely about the world champions, just doesn't feel right but that has been the case for a long time now and it's not gonna change anytime soon.

I think you missed my point about the rosters a bit. Of course it matters how good the roster quality is, and it determines who is favourite. Has nothing to do with A/B/C roster though, as constantly bringing up the players at home only looks like searching for excuses in advance.
And Swiss are no more favs than FIN, SWE or CAN, the betting odds are pretty much even between all those teams.

 

[Rabid Ranger]

The U.S. had a good run in the prelims and still gets a tough out in the quarters. Honestly, all of the games look like good ones. Will need to stay disciplined and use our speed and puck moving to our advantage, Hopefully get a couple of goals early and get that needed stop from DeSmith when we need it Optimistic, but I think this will be a tough fight.

 

[member 305909]

I'm glad that FIN-CAN happens now so we're at last going to have a different final.

 

[Old Man Jags]

Agreed completely about the world champions, just doesn't feel right but that has been the case for a long time now and it's not gonna change anytime soon.

I think you missed my point about the rosters a bit. Of course it matters how good the roster quality is, and it determines who is favourite. Has nothing to do with A/B/C roster though, as constantly bringing up the players at home only looks like searching for excuses in advance.
And Swiss are no more favs than FIN, SWE or CAN, the betting odds are pretty much even between all those teams.

I think the Swiss should be faves, if only on the basis of how convincing they have been from start to finish so far. Good to watch for neutrals, not just Swiss fans.

 

[Mestaruus]

I got Czechia, the Swiss, Finland and Sweden coming through.

That would be the Euro Hockey Tour group .

 

[karhukissa]

Every fan base has a segment that complains or makes excuses, look at how Slovak fans reacted to the Swiss sitting out all those players yesterday or check out the Sweden-us gdt thread from yesterday to see the howling from some Swedish fans on the knee on knee fiasco and the reffing. I could give you a million more examples.

I just don't understand this fixation some fans have with............" only Canadian fans do it" or."Canadian fans do it worse"

I mean cmon guys........................you're all smart enough to know that's just not true.

I'm not a saint either, but as you know there's been quite a few Canada-Finland games with big importance like finals and such. One thing in common with these games are Canadian fans moaning about this tournament being inconsequential and you having a Z-team, while Finns are usually moaning about the refs.

And mark my words, if Canada loses tomorrow we'll see the same thing. I guess it's kind of an alibi and cope, but at this point it's kinda old thing.

 

[SwissFan12]

Well the 2019 Finland knocks out Russia A-team without allowing a goal. And they did this without any of their big name.

So yes, having big name is a great thing but you also need to have a good structure, good coaching and a good battle mentality.

 

[garbageteam]

Hoping for USA, SUI, CAN and LAT, but head says USA, SUI, FIN and SWE

 

[Czechboy]

Last 5 Semi Finalists in case you are wondering:

Canada has made all 5.
Finland had made 4..
US has made 3 of them.
Sweden has made 2 of them.
Swiss have made 1.
Czechs have made 2.
Russians have made 2 (out of 3).
Germans have made one.

It really is a shame about Canada and the Finn's because this really has been their tournament. US on a nice tidy run here too!

 

[karhukissa]

Well the 2019 Finland knocks out Russia A-team without allowing a goal. And they did this without any of their big name.

So yes, having big name is a great thing but you also need to have a good structure, good coaching and a good battle mentality.

Yup but it's just weak cope to say that Switzerland has close to A-team and that's why they should be clear favourites. There's only silver medals available for Swiss fans because if they lose, they lose to worse teams and if they win, it's because other teams didn't have close to their A-team. Welcome to the club.

It's just silly to talk about players that aren't playing. Like history has shown, you can lose with superior teams and actually that happens more often than not if you look at the recent history.

 

[Conspiracy Theorist]

Well the 2019 Finland knocks out Russia A-team without allowing a goal. And they did this without any of their big name.

So yes, having big name is a great thing but you also need to have a good structure, good coaching and a good battle mentality.

True that. Having star players doesn't guarantee anything like Russia proved it in 2019. That was a ridiculously stacked roster by the Worlds standards.

 

[weklof]

Last 5 Semi Finalists in case you are wondering:

View attachment 712161

Finland had made all 5.

Finland missed in 2018 according to that chart, but I think your point still stands

 

[Czechboy]

Finland missed in 2018 according to that chart, but I think your point still stands

Fixed and thank you

 

[karhukissa]

Finland missed in 2018 according to that chart, but I think your point still stands

2018 tournament was actually meaningless and also low altitude in Denmark affected on Finnish team according to rumours.

 

[jj cale]

I'm not a saint either, but as you know there's been quite a few Canada-Finland games with big importance like finals and such. One thing in common with these games are Canadian fans moaning about this tournament being inconsequential and you having a Z-team, while Finns are usually moaning about the refs.

And mark my words, if Canada loses tomorrow we'll see the same thing. I guess it's kind of an alibi and cope, but at this point it's kinda old thing.

Fans are gonna be fans no matter where they come from. sure, if Canada loses some of their fans will moan, as will some of the Finnish fans if they lose, they always do.

The point is it isn't some nationality specific behaviour,, which I am sure you must be aware of, you can;t have been here as long as you have and not know that.

 

[Eye of Ra]

True that. Having star players doesn't guarantee anything like Russia proved it in 2019. That was a ridiculously stacked roster by the Worlds standards.

yep, sweden aswell in 2019

 

[illone84]

2018 tournament was actually meaningless and also low altitude in Denmark affected on Finnish team according to rumours.

Ye. Low altitude in their heads from horrific coaching coupled with a Swiss team loaded with their best nhl talent at the time that beat them in the qf

 

[Eye of Ra]

Sandin is injured, Sweden gets even worse now