Nice win for the Russian's, can't believe they still haven't lost a game. Sokolov was very solid out there, best performance by him thus far.
It was Kovalchuk's best game too IMO (he got the Russian Player of the Game too, to the disgust of the Austrian Mediazone commentator), finally got a chance to unleash his one-timer from the point on the powerplay and guess what happened.... He also set up Zino with a nice play which should have ended in a goal, and hit the post from his own slot in the dying seconds towards an empty net. He does still seem invisible most of the time, but I supposed he's only getting half the ice time we're used to seeing him get so that's probably half of it.
I really wish they'd stop giving Vyshedkevich and Karpovtsev powerplay time while super-star players who are experienced in being PPQB's are warming the bench (Kovalchuk/Kovalev). Other than Markov the Russian defense seem so boring and predictable when on the power play.
I wasn't that impressed by Semin, although he did seem to get in good offensive opportunities out there. His turnover in his own zone in the final 10 mins set Straka (I think..) up for a dangerous shot in the slot, and Semin completely muffed up the shorthanded 2 on 1 he had. Still, you can see the talent the kid has. Kovalev and Datsyuk made a few boneheaded moves that game too, but those two are always dangerous together no matter how bad they're playing.
This win wasn't meaningless. If we beat Kazakhstan (we will decide our position - +1) we will stay in Vienna +2 and It will help our team to believe that we can +3.
We are the only unbeaten team at tournament despite only Sloveina had worse PP and PK before this game than we were 
