MOSCOW, March 8 Torpedo hockey player Anton Silaev miraculously escaped serious injury after a forceful reception from SKA defender Alexander Nikishin, it was an attempt to inflict injury on the part of a player of the St. Petersburg team, head coach of the Nizhny Novgorod club Igor Larionov said after the fourth match of the 1/8 finals of the Gagarin Cup.
The meeting took place on Thursday in Nizhny Novgorod and ended with a score of 4:1 in favor of the guests. In the second period of the match, Nikishin performed a power move on Silaev, hitting him in the knee area. The Torpedo defender was able to leave the ice only with the help of his teammates. He later returned to the game. The match referees initially sent Nikishin off, but after a video review they canceled the fine for the army captain.
““As for the situation with Silaev, I, frankly, am simply shocked by the decision of the referees. Thank God that there was no tearing off of the knee, ligaments, and so on. We could have lost the guy, it was an attempt to cause injury,” Larionov said at a press conference, the video of which was published on the official Torpedo YouTube channel.
SKA wins the series up to four wins with a score of 3-1. The fifth match of the confrontation will take place on March 9 in St. Petersburg.