The Ice Hockey World Championship was supposed to be a holiday in Russia. St. Petersburg was getting ready to host the main hockey forum of the planet, and the Russian national team was preparing to take a new path to gold. But this holiday unfairly passed without us. The International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF), under a fictitious pretext of concern for safety, decided to deprive St. Petersburg of the right to host the tournament with political overtones, and the Russian team to compete with the main hockey powers of the world. And not only them.
«Everyone has learned to play hockey» — this expression has become increasingly popular over the past years. And this thesis found its next confirmation at the last championship, which was held in Finnish Tampere and Latvian Riga.
Two key statistical indicators:
- The Latvian national team, led by Olegs Znark's longtime companion Harijs Vitolins, well-known for his successful work in Russia, after two defeats at the start of the championship, scored a series of six victories in a row, and then in the match for third place beat the US team, which had not known defeats at this World Cup until the semifinals. In their modern history, Latvians have never risen above seventh place, and today they bathe in bronze for the first time.
- For the first time since 1992, when the now classic group stage + playoff system was used at the World Cup, the German national team played in the final and won silver medals, losing to Canada.
For us, this championship is on a par with the previous one so or else would be contradictory.
On the one hand, we are talking about the lack of proper interest in the tournament due to the non-participation of the Russian team in it, and we learn about the events of the championship only after the fact, seeing the final results of the matches and the entire championship. On the other hand, the moments of the World Cup are still being discussed, news and materials about this are being read, and talk about low match attendance is becoming irrelevant. For comparison, the matches of the 2016 World Cup in Moscow and St. Petersburg were attended by fewer spectators in total than the games of the last championship. Still, the World Championship is still one of the main hockey events of the year, this status cannot be taken away from it.
And speaking about the level of the championship, we ask ourselves the question: «Can it be considered legitimate in the absence of the Russian team at the championship — traditionally one of the main contenders for gold?» Talking about the successes of the same Latvians and Germans will inevitably lead to reflections about whether they would have happened if the Russians had participated in the tournament. There is some logic in this. The Russian team always treats the World Cup with the proper attitude and intentions to succeed at all costs. It is much less likely that the Russian team would have allowed themselves such liberties, because of which the weak-willed Swedes and the Americans, who do not hesitate to trust the responsibility for the result to young people and players from the AHL, are left without victories from time to time.
At the same time, we cannot say with certainty that the Russian team, if it had participated in this championship, would have avoided a fiasco. Hockey is a sport and everything is possible in it. Therefore, it is also wrong to belittle the dignity of the successes of Latvia and Germany. The Latvians have gathered perhaps the strongest team of all times and, under the guidance of an experienced Vitolins with a strong spirit and character, they rightly got to the medals.
For the Germans, the level of hockey is regularly growing, and their players confidently perform in the NHL. The same Moritz Seider was named the league's 2021-22 Rookie of the Year, ahead of the Toronto Maple Leafs' Michael Banting and Anaheim Ducks star Trevor Zegras. In the end, it was Germany that almost deprived Russia of the dream of Olympic gold in 2018. Today's results may look ridiculous and absurd, but you shouldn't be surprised by them.
On the contrary, such outcomes are needed, if only to ensure that we are ready for such resistance before our return to the international arena and draw the right conclusions during the suspension, raising the level of hockey in the country.
But what about the rest of the unspoken favorites championship? The Swedes once again confirmed their status as weak-willed hockey players when it comes to battles in the playoffs, and they themselves gave the Latvians a ticket to the semifinals. The Finns were not lucky enough to get to Canada, which can bring even the 30th squad to the tournament, but still reach the final. We saw this, for example, at the 2021 World Cup, when Canadians, with anti-records behind them, beat Russia in the quarterfinals and eventually became champions. The Americans traditionally brought second-rate NHL players and players from the AHL, along with students, to the championship and, objectively, initially did not claim medals. The Czechs are now a strong middle peasant, and for them the departure in the quarterfinals was a completely expected result. In addition, the Czech team lost several players at the start of the tournament due to injuries.
On the bottom line, there is only one question left to worry about — «How would the Russian team perform at such a level?» And it is still open for discussion.