MUNICH, Germany – The Deutschland-Cup started with Slovakia against the USA. The Slovakia players wanted to forget the result at the world cup this year in their own country, when they finished 10th. Glen Hanlon had to go as coach and Vladimir Vujtek was slotted into the position. He trusted more or less the team from the world cup, maybe to gain a level of respect for the team. On the other side, the USA team is built from players from all over Europe. Most of the team are playing in the German top league DEL, but there are also players from the KHL, the Swedish Elite League and the Austrian EBEL.
Maybe this well-cooperating was the difference between the two teams, because the Slovakian team was from the beginning the dominating team in this game. With this domination, they scored the first goal after 10 minutes from Michael Miklik. The rest of the first and the second period were more or less playing down the clock. The USA had not found a way to break through Slovakian goalie Peter Hamerlik, and in the last period it was Miklik again, who scored to make it 2-0 after a pass from Marian Blizna.
This was also the final result and the first win for Slowakia. The USA did not play very well. Although, both coaches said at the press conference, that the other team was the better one.
In the second match of the day, the German team played their neighbors from Switzerland. This game marked the appearance of the new national coach for the German team, Jakob Koelliker who is from Switzerland.
The Germans had a strong beginning, and after 3 minutes the first penalty for the Swiss was the result. While the home team found their positions in the attacking zone, Swiss forward Kevin Romy got the puck in the zone, skated by the German defenders in front of goalkeeper Dimitri Pätzold and with a nice move, he put the puck through the legs of the goalie for the shorthanded goal.
After this surprising lead, the Germans were motivated to score the equalizer.
But this happened not in the first period, but after 10 minutes in the second. Kai Hospelt played the pass to Andre Rankel and he scored the equalizer for the in golden jersey playing Germans. And two minutes later, Phillipp Gogulla scored the 2-1 lead. With this result the second period ended. The last period started with a thunderbolt, when Nicolai Goc scored the 3-1 lead after just 12 seconds.
But the game wasn’t decided because the Swiss team in person of Julien Sprunger scored 5 minutes afterwards for 3-2. But in the following minutes the Swiss were unable to score the tying goal. On the German counter-attack, Gogulla gained a technical goal, because the Swiss pulled their goalie.
With these results, Germany leads the table with the Slovakia on the second place and the USA and Switzerland on the 3rd and 4th positions.
Robin.Hilger@prohockeynews.com
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