What happend with Ukraine?
- Thread starter Eye of Ra
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The Colonel
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- Jul 7, 2008
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The Ukraine is not weak!!!!
- May 3, 2021
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Eye of Ra
Grandmaster General of the International boards
Ukraine was never at the level of Latvia.
Their entire national team was based on Kiev Sokil prospects, which is a team that played in the Soviet top division. After the USSR collapsed, there was almost no continuation and their national team aged like a pear.
All their players became older with very little influx of young players. The average age of the Ukrainian national team in 2007-8 was 31/32.
So they basically just withered away naturally.
Soccer is the dominant sport there and there's no bright future for hockey for a country that's not a whole lot more economically advanced than some sub-Saharan African countries. Very few can afford to play hockey. But even if they could, this would be a 3rd tier team in the World Champs along Austria, France and the like.
Their entire national team was based on Kiev Sokil prospects, which is a team that played in the Soviet top division. After the USSR collapsed, there was almost no continuation and their national team aged like a pear.
All their players became older with very little influx of young players. The average age of the Ukrainian national team in 2007-8 was 31/32.
So they basically just withered away naturally.
Soccer is the dominant sport there and there's no bright future for hockey for a country that's not a whole lot more economically advanced than some sub-Saharan African countries. Very few can afford to play hockey. But even if they could, this would be a 3rd tier team in the World Champs along Austria, France and the like.
SoundAndFury
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- May 28, 2012
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Yeah, the simple answer is they don't love hockey. Other than a few hockey hotbeds most Ukrainians don't care about it at all. And like Namejs said, country in their situation, it's natural to focus on that one sport you are kind of good at and the population is interested in, which is football in their case.
Zine
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- Feb 28, 2002
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As has been stated, nobody cares about hockey. Even back in the day interest was at minimal levels; but an infrastructure and development program existed to ensure some high level players were produced. But even at that, Sokol Kiev still had to import Russian born players to be competitive.
Funding all dried up when USSR collapsed. It all goes to soccer nowadays.
Funding all dried up when USSR collapsed. It all goes to soccer nowadays.
As some have pointed out hockey was never going to flourish in independent Ukraine, that has little to do with corruption or the war. If the sport was big in Western Ukraine and became an expression of nationhood like it did in Latvia maybe things could be different, but it wasn't so it didn't.
I would add to all other answers that there was a push to revive hockey in Ukraine in the early 2010s, with a KHL team established in Donetsk. But the war put a pause/stop to that push.
After Donbas joined the Russian competitions also the roster was Russified, playing in the KHL did not significantly benefit Ukrainian hockey.
Dirtyf1ghter
Registered User
- Aug 7, 2019
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Ukrainian players were the result of the formation of the U.S.S.R.
The finding is therefore not new.
Artur Cholach was the first player selected since 2007 and the first born after the fall of the U.S.S.R.
It is up to the Ukrainian federation to work to change this. But the demographic crash is more powerful than elsewhere in Europe.
The country is emptying quickly. Very few young people.
The finding is therefore not new.
Artur Cholach was the first player selected since 2007 and the first born after the fall of the U.S.S.R.
It is up to the Ukrainian federation to work to change this. But the demographic crash is more powerful than elsewhere in Europe.
The country is emptying quickly. Very few young people.
Well, of course, at that point there were barely any KHL level Ukrainian players that Donbass could have used. Hence results of Donbass' existence would had been felt much later if there were any. But Donbass played way too little to have any impact on Ukrainian hockey, or even to judge if it was helping or not.
Yozhik v tumane
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- Jan 2, 2019
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You know what the Ukraine is? It's a sitting duck. A road apple. The Ukraine is feeble. I think it's time to put the hurt on the Ukraine.
Hockey is expensive and Ukrainians don't make a lot of money and can't afford it. They are getting better at soccer though.
The Colonel
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SoundAndFury
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- May 28, 2012
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How about I take your little HFBoard and SMASH
Zine
Registered User
- Feb 28, 2002
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The 'hockey revival' project was implemented by Russian entities though. War or no war, Western Ukraine was unlikely to climb on board for obvious reasons; especially considering nobody cares about the sport to begin with. I mean the owner of Donbass who brought the KHL to Donetsk was in the Party of Regions. Good luck with that in Kiev.
I suppose, without hostilities, the game could've grown a little amongst ethnic Russians in Donbass, but, all in all, the disappearance of the game has nothing to do with war.
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There are more young people in Ukraine than in Sweden, Finland, Czech Republic and Switzerland combined.
So using this as an argument is extremely dumb.
Those young people don't have the money, live in a economically and politically challenged society, a lot of them think mostly about living elsewehere and not becoming an athlete at home and then again football is the one sport the country is good at, so if they think of an athlete's career, then hockey is certainly not their first choice.
Look at Germany. It does not have most of the issues, but the dominance of football is the same.
Ukraine has good individual athletes in a number of sports, for example in combat disciplines some of the best in the world. But successful sports teams are few and far between other than in soccer. In Germany football may be highly popular, but I would not say that it is especially dominant in terms of merits.
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