WC: 2018 - Team Czech Republic

Jablkon

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May 23, 2014
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Chomutov (my hometown club) is quite new in Extraleague (in EL since since 2016 ) . And from Chomutov are Kase O., Kampf, Kase D. + add Rutta and Sulak who also are from Chomutov. And their best gem is Jakub Lauko. So I'd say Chomutov is doing well.

If only every czech club was working as Chomutov with young players!
That was maybe my wrong formulation. I meant what you saying. Chomutov is smaller and very good in terms of development.
 

Jablkon

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Straka brings youngsters up every year in Pilsen and imo they try to play modern offensive hockey every year, but it's been a long time since Škodovka produced a 1st round NHL talent. It's surprisingly difficult for them to find any big sponsors, nobody wants to invest money in hockey in the Pils area.

Sparta should be the club to set the trends and compete at the highest level every year, they have all the needed resources, great facilites and good media PR. Instead they don't seem to have any conception whatsoever, they bring in 'star' players from abroad who are usually old and washed up and when they fail, they throw them all out and start all over again. It's a managment/ownership problem ... Bříza is not the right guy imo.

Still, our Junior leagues are by far the biggest problem. You just can't grow a serious amount of potential star players in an enviroment with such a weak level of competition. Too many teams, too many weak players, to many bad hockey games, the guys with talent don't grow. I know CSLH wants the talented juniors in the WSM liga but that doesn't solve the problem. A quality Junior league system is a cornerstone of a good hockey program. The last U20 players who went to the NHL/AHL right from the Czech enviroment were Hertl/Chytil and hopefully will be Necas and Kaut. I'm really interested how guys like Pytlik or Mysak will turn out, but it's still not enough. The defensemen situation is absolutely terrible and it doesn't look to get better anytime soon, guys like Kral, Zabransky, Galvas are not gonna be 1st/2nd pairing NHL defensemen imo. Hopefully i'm wrong.
Yeah, I am Sparta fan and I can not agree more unfortunately. I am not saying Briza is wrong guy but they should transform to organization. As to Pilsen, if everything goes well in economy, money should imo come. Pilsen will be better then because Straka knows how to do that.

But what bothers me is that they are not able to sit together and work on it. They dont have any results, they havent completed targets they set up (like Ds several years ago). Instead of it looks like fragmented enviroment where no one knows what they do in other clubs.
 

Mirinho

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I'd even cancel junior extraleague. Competitive ppl (CSLH, teams, coaches etc.) would pick (draft) 90 best players (kids) and all kids will be split to 3 U20 teams. Team red, blue and white for example. These teams will be playing in 1st league (maybe even in EL, we will see in future how this will work). It could be one moravian team, one prague team and one northwest team. But of course northwest team (lets say their hometown will be Litomerice for example) can pick kid from Ostrava.

The rest of kids who won't be picked to this 3 teams can continue playing hockey. There still be league etc. But it will be more like hobby league. If some of them will improve, U20 teams can sign them later (like in NHL etc.)

Can you imagine the pressure on players? How hard they will work to stay in this teams amd to get to this teams?

CZE national team U20 will be composed from these 3 teams
 
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Jablkon

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So U20 - 18 teams (8 are not making playoffs)
U18 - 25 teams in 5 divisions (4 uncompetitive teams at least)
U16 - 30 teams in 3 divisions (3 uncompettive teams in every division)

I know this will change next season. Still its strange. No one could probably expect RB Salzburg to travel across the whole country but its hard not to have feeling that U18 and U16 are designed to reduce costs and U20 to have all teams in first league.

They also play ridiculously low amount of matches in U16 and U18 - 16-18 matches in the season and then they jump to 34 in U20.

So they don’t even meet all opponents and playoff rounds are played by one game in U16 and U18 if I am correct. I mean its imo good to have RBS there but what’s the benefit of it when half of the teams don’t meet them. So as RBS probably lost one match (in overtime) in entire season and they lost a title. This is just bizzare. What is the benefit of it or additional value for development of young players?

Maybe too many breaks for national teams so they play such a low amount of games? I just trying to find any rationale behind it.

Edit: I see swedish and finnish juniors are quite hard to understand at first view too but at least it looks they play more matches.
 
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Czechboy

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So U20 - 18 teams (8 are not making playoffs)
U18 - 25 teams in 5 divisions (4 uncompetitive teams at least)
U16 - 30 teams in 3 divisions (3 uncompettive teams in every division)

I know this will change next season. Still its strange. No one could probably expect RB Salzburg to travel across the whole country but its hard not to have feeling that U18 and U16 are designed to reduce costs and U20 to have all teams in first league.

They also play ridiculously low amount of matches in U16 and U18 - 16-18 matches in the season and then they jump to 34 in U20.

So they don’t even meet all opponents and playoff rounds are played by one game in U16 and U18 if I am correct. I mean its imo good to have RBS there but what’s the benefit of it when half of the teams don’t meet them. So as RBS probably lost one match (in overtime) in entire season and they lost a title. This is just bizzare. What is the benefit of it or additional value for development of young players?

Maybe too many breaks for national teams so they play such a low amount of games? I just trying to find any rationale behind it.

Edit: I see swedish and finnish juniors are quite hard to understand at first view too but at least it looks they play more matches.

I love all this discussion.. to me, also reptitive, but the BIGGEST problem in Czech hockey is no development from 18 to 20. Sitting on a bench in Extraliga does not count as 'development' and the U20 and U18 leagues have no history of guys jumping to the NHL.

The contrast is Canada. I live in London, Ontario home to the London Knights... 10,000 seat arena sold out every game and they play a full 80 game schedule. Knights develop more NHL players than the Czech Republic and this is a town of 400,000 people.

18 to 20 year olds need to play a LOT in all situations. They also need good competition. So, if half the 18 to 20 year olds leave for the CHL the talent pool gets weakend. There are so many Czechs that come over, toil around in CHL and then eventually head back to Czech leagues. It's not good at all for development.

I don't have a solution for this at all but Czech development is very bad.

Also, I notice there is a lot of talk about using Extraliga to develop players - they really don't do that at all. Rutta recently jumped from Extraliga to NHL. Hertl did it. Necas will do it in his second try (70% chance of direct jump but could end up in AHL first). Kaut might also do it (30% chance he goes direct to NHL and stays there). I can't think of many more that have done it?

The idea of less teams seemed intriguing. The 3 dedicated teams also seems good but I can't shake the image (from my couch in Canada) that those U20 and U18 Czech leagues are filled with some very uncompetitve hockey and played in front of 50 people. Coming to Canada as an 18 year old and learing the language and changing your style of game also doesn't help.

As far as the D... academies sound great. But will we be teaching the Swedish style only to find out, 5 years from now, that isn't the 'style' anymore. We are behind.
 
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Jablkon

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I love all this discussion.. to me, also reptitive, but the BIGGEST problem in Czech hockey is no development from 18 to 20. Sitting on a bench in Extraliga does not count as 'development' and the U20 and U18 leagues have no history of guys jumping to the NHL.

The contrast is Canada. I live in London, Ontario home to the London Knights... 10,000 seat arena sold out every game and they play a full 80 game schedule. Knights develop more NHL players than the Czech Republic and this is a town of 400,000 people.

18 to 20 year olds need to play a LOT in all situations. They also need good competition. So, if half the 18 to 20 year olds leave for the CHL the talent pool gets weakend. There are so many Czechs that come over, toil around in CHL and then eventually head back to Czech leagues. It's not good at all for development.

I don't have a solution for this at all but Czech development is very bad.

Also, I notice there is a lot of talk about using Extraliga to develop players - they really don't do that at all. Rutta recently jumped from Extraliga to NHL. Hertl did it. Necas will do it in his second try (70% chance of direct jump but could end up in AHL first). Kaut might also do it (30% chance he goes direct to NHL and stays there). I can't think of many more that have done it?

The idea of less teams seemed intriguing. The 3 dedicated teams also seems good but I can't shake the image (from my couch in Canada) that those U20 and U18 Czech leagues are filled with some very uncompetitve hockey and played in front of 50 people. Coming to Canada as an 18 year old and learing the language and changing your style of game also doesn't help.

As far as the D... academies sound great. But will we be teaching the Swedish style only to find out, 5 years from now, that isn't the 'style' anymore. We are behind.
I am afraid attendance will remain same. Extraleague should imo partly serve for development as its not best league in the world anyway and only way to stay competitive is to develope players for NHL. This would imo bring strong second tier of players like Nakladal who would be able to handle WHC level.

Unfortunately it more looks like some clubs take care only of their things and have no will to see bigger picture. Like CEO of Hradec Kralove? This guy is basically trolling everything.

What is obvious is that discussion about these issues looks completely amateur here. That makes most of fans mad imo.

But yeah, its repetitive and what can you do about that. This is imo on the edge that some group of fans should write open letter with questions towards association. Otherwise I dont see solution of this issue. I personally do not even understand why are fans so satisfied with extraleague. Not saying it is bad but it is obvious that it is slow, old and style is bit of oldschool.

I mean we all agree here. This is just bizzare.

What you do in London if I may ask?
 

joey16

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First of all and that is something someone was already mentioning here before we need transparency. The association should determine publicly some goals in terms of development and track those goals. Something like in management is the SMART method - specific, mesuarable, achievable, realistic, time-bound. For example determine a goal to have every year 12+ players drafted including at least one in TOP10, two in first round, etc, it could go more into detail... and every year evaluate and analyze by comeptitive people, and of course every analysis like this could be easily found on the internet or somewhere by fans and media.
For example right now I would like to see from the association something like, we have to focus on the defensemen so we will set a goal of having at least 1 defensman in the first round every year, 2-3 in first two rounds, and 5-6 overall. And every year make a deep analysis what changed, what caused it was successful/unsuccessful. During that time follow closely the best defensmen in domestic leagues and see how they progress and how the teams are working with them. Obviously teams, coaches must be involved. And maybe come up with some reward for the teams whose players will achieve the first or second round so they are motivated. Some teams don't seem to care about this since they don't see any advantage of raising a good player to have him just for two, three years in their A-team and then see him leaving. This is also wrong.
Of course having this kind of plan is just the start, the real work would be done somewhere else but responsible for this would be the association which would after the evaluation draw consequences from it.

Right now all we hear from Lener and Kral is just things are getting better and when we look at the results from 5-8 years ago when we took over we can see the difference etc. It's true but there is nothing specific, mostly just general phrases - like we need to focus on the development of the defensmen. But how ? What is their plan, what changes are they willing to make to raise good defensmen. We know nothing. Sometimes to me it almost looks like they are already satisfied with current situation and that we got better a bit over the last several years is good enough. No! We should still set higher and higher challenges. Have players in TOP10 in the draft regularly, keep the number of drafted players above 10 and even increase it over the time.
I mean just look at how many drafted players over the last 5 years have teams from TOP5. Just taken the European countries (Canada and USA is another level):
Sweden: 125
Finland: 71
Russia: 74
Czech Republic: 36

This is I think the best look back at how we are successful in raising individuals. And how are we supposed to keep up with the TOP5 and bring home medals when there is such a deficiency in terms of depth?
Lener and Kral will tell you that the number of czech players drafted is increasing but don't say the "but" after. Now it's time to focus on how to achieve the same number of drafted players as Finland and Russia (at first at least, Sweden is long-term much far away so far). Sadly, I see no conception like this whatsoever.
 

lamini

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Well, it feels like the ppl that are in charge don't realy want to change things...right now, the situation is bad, but they have good jobs, their friends have good jobs, here and there we can organise WCH which gives jobs to even more of their friends...if things change too much, they may be replaced so for them it's best to do just so much that hockey still gets money from goverment (and that is feeling I have about most our formerly "BIG" sports, while sports that get much less money are doing much better lately thanks to ppl being there for love of that sport more than for money)
 

czechmate

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I know that this has been posted already a number of times, but its terribly annoying and I really feel the need to share this :)

Watching the Swiss team playing the gold medal game yesterday was just wonderful. It clearly shows the huge progress the Swiss team has made throughout the last years, both in league standard and youth development (Müller, Fiala, etc.). They will enter the top 6 very soon, if they continue at this pace - and there is no reason why they shouldn't. I'm happy for them - hard work combined with faith can move mountains!

Czechs on the other hand have rested on their laurels for far too long and there is NO END in sight of this terrible development. Once that moment will appear, when the people responsible in Czech hockey will finally recognize the deficiencies of our youth development program it would take quite some time to see an effect (you just don't fix a broken system that was supported for over 10 years over night). I therefore reckon (I hope I'm wrong) that the Swiss will overtake us as top 6 nation within the near future. I mean look at it, its not far fetched at all:

Top Swiss D: Josi, Sbisa, Diaz, Müller (the rest of Swiss D I saw during the last two weeks were young and impressive too, guys like Fora or Frick)
Top Czech D: Gudas, maybe Sulak & Hronek (otherwise really shaky options :D)

Swiss O: Hischier, Niederreiter, Andrighetto, Fiala, Malgin (what talent compared to 10 years ago)
Czech O: Voracek, Pastrnak, Krejci, Hertl, Palat, Necas, Kase

Whereas Czech D is clearly weaker than Swiss D already, I think Czech O depth still has the upper hand - but for how long? As soon as Voracek and Krejci will hang up their skates we get into trouble! Gosh, I just hope some of the new guys make it big time (Necas, Zadina, Kaut, Raska, Novak, Mysak) - or else the train has left.

Although I really hate the perpetual negativity that this topic produces, there is not much to be excited about looking into the future as a Czech hockey supporter...
 

Rexor

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^^This is overly pessimistic indeed. The Swiss have Josi but outside of him, their defense isn't better. Czech forwards are better and significantly deeper. Ditto for goalies. Since 2012, the Swiss had 7 players drafted in Round 1 & 2, the Czechs 15; yes, that's really bad but the Swiss aren't overtaking us anytime soon. Not even close.

Of course, it's not to take anything away from the Swiss hockey program and their recent improvements. But we're indeed kinda isolated at the Number 6 spot - clearly lagging behind No 5, clearly ahead No 7. Things aren't improving fast enough but let's not be unnecessarily negative.
 
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Wooren

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Classic. Czechs lose QFs and everything this thread offers since then is pessimism.

So Switzerland is officialy better than us. 2 medals in last six years. We have zero.
Slovakia has more WJC medals than the Czech Republic in the last 13 years. Do you consider their youth better?

Chomutov (my hometown club) is quite new in Extraleague (in EL since since 2016 ) . And from Chomutov are Kase O., Kampf, Kase D. + add Rutta and Sulak who also are from Chomutov. And their best gem is Jakub Lauko. So I'd say Chomutov is doing well.

If only every czech club was working as Chomutov with young players!
Can't really ask for much more than that kind of production. Chomutov is not a big-time club in the Czech Republic and yet they produce(d) much better prospects than traditional teams like Sparta, Litvinov or Kladno altoghether lately.

...The defensemen situation is absolutely terrible and it doesn't look to get better anytime soon, guys like Kral, Zabransky, Galvas are not gonna be 1st/2nd pairing NHL defensemen imo. Hopefully i'm wrong.
I think Galvas can be a good one. I liked him in the EHT tournaments, he is getting lots of time in Olomouc and is developing well. That being said, players like him or Hajek are more of the exceptions than the rule unfortunately.


I'd even cancel junior extraleague. Competitive ppl (CSLH, teams, coaches etc.) would pick (draft) 90 best players (kids) and all kids will be split to 3 U20 teams. Team red, blue and white for example. These teams will be playing in 1st league (maybe even in EL, we will see in future how this will work). It could be one moravian team, one prague team and one northwest team. But of course northwest team (lets say their hometown will be Litomerice for example) can pick kid from Ostrava.

The rest of kids who won't be picked to this 3 teams can continue playing hockey. There still be league etc. But it will be more like hobby league. If some of them will improve, U20 teams can sign them later (like in NHL etc.)

Can you imagine the pressure on players? How hard they will work to stay in this teams amd to get to this teams?

CZE national team U20 will be composed from these 3 teams
I very much doubt this would work for many reasons.

I know that this has been posted already a number of times, but its terribly annoying and I really feel the need to share this :)

Watching the Swiss team playing the gold medal game yesterday was just wonderful. It clearly shows the huge progress the Swiss team has made throughout the last years, both in league standard and youth development (Müller, Fiala, etc.). They will enter the top 6 very soon, if they continue at this pace - and there is no reason why they shouldn't. I'm happy for them - hard work combined with faith can move mountains!

Czechs on the other hand have rested on their laurels for far too long and there is NO END in sight of this terrible development. Once that moment will appear, when the people responsible in Czech hockey will finally recognize the deficiencies of our youth development program it would take quite some time to see an effect (you just don't fix a broken system that was supported for over 10 years over night). I therefore reckon (I hope I'm wrong) that the Swiss will overtake us as top 6 nation within the near future. I mean look at it, its not far fetched at all:

Top Swiss D: Josi, Sbisa, Diaz, Müller (the rest of Swiss D I saw during the last two weeks were young and impressive too, guys like Fora or Frick)
Top Czech D: Gudas, maybe Sulak & Hronek (otherwise really shaky options :D)

Swiss O: Hischier, Niederreiter, Andrighetto, Fiala, Malgin (what talent compared to 10 years ago)
Czech O: Voracek, Pastrnak, Krejci, Hertl, Palat, Necas, Kase

Whereas Czech D is clearly weaker than Swiss D already, I think Czech O depth still has the upper hand - but for how long? As soon as Voracek and Krejci will hang up their skates we get into trouble! Gosh, I just hope some of the new guys make it big time (Necas, Zadina, Kaut, Raska, Novak, Mysak) - or else the train has left.

Although I really hate the perpetual negativity that this topic produces, there is not much to be excited about looking into the future as a Czech hockey supporter...
In short - unless every top Czech prospect busts hard, Switzerland is not getting into the top 6. They are not there and they won't be in the near future.

In a bit more detail - Swiss have made up for a lot of the gap between us and them, I am not doubting that. While they managed produce top flight NHLers Josi and Niederreiter (along with some other NHL depth), the best we got from the 2008-11 or so are depth players (Palat being the sole exception). Starting with 96s however, Czech juniors got the upper hand again and are beating their Swiss counterparts like 90% of the time.
That will soon start to translate to the top level.
 

czechmate

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Classic. Czechs lose QFs and everything this thread offers since then is pessimism.


Slovakia has more WJC medals than the Czech Republic in the last 13 years. Do you consider their youth better?


Can't really ask for much more than that kind of production. Chomutov is not a big-time club in the Czech Republic and yet they produce(d) much better prospects than traditional teams like Sparta, Litvinov or Kladno altoghether lately.


I think Galvas can be a good one. I liked him in the EHT tournaments, he is getting lots of time in Olomouc and is developing well. That being said, players like him or Hajek are more of the exceptions than the rule unfortunately.



I very much doubt this would work for many reasons.


In short - unless every top Czech prospect busts hard, Switzerland is not getting into the top 6. They are not there and they won't be in the near future.

In a bit more detail - Swiss have made up for a lot of the gap between us and them, I am not doubting that. While they managed produce top flight NHLers Josi and Niederreiter (along with some other NHL depth), the best we got from the 2008-11 or so are depth players (Palat being the sole exception). Starting with 96s however, Czech juniors got the upper hand again and are beating their Swiss counterparts like 90% of the time.
That will soon start to translate to the top level.


I do not see it as pessimism, rather as a realistic scenario if the current model carries on for another 10 years or so. Sometimes you need to come clean and discuss the issues that are at stake, if you want to see real improvement.

As I have mentioned previously, offensively we still have a wide margin separating us from the Swiss. But on the defensive side - time will tell.

I hope that we can turn it around! All of us that have voiced their concern (I assume) want to see some kind of reaction or that the issues are being addressed. In order to start working towards a goal and developing a vision, you need to acknowledge your deficiencies...
 
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czechmate

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^^This is overly pessimistic indeed. The Swiss have Josi but outside of him, their defense isn't better. Czech forwards are better and significantly deeper. Ditto for goalies. Since 2012, the Swiss had 7 players drafted in Round 1 & 2, the Czechs 15; yes, that's really bad but the Swiss aren't overtaking us anytime soon. Not even close.

Of course, it's not to take anything away from the Swiss hockey program and their recent improvements. But we're indeed kinda isolated at the Number 6 spot - clearly lagging behind No 5, clearly ahead No 7. Things aren't improving fast enough but let's not be unnecessarily negative.

Have you recently seen some of the Swiss games in Denmark? I have basically seen all of the Swiss games and the efforts of Swiss defensemen from both NHL & NLA have been quite impressive and the very opposite of an error-prone defense.
 

Wooren

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I do not see it as pessimism, rather as a realistic scenario if the current model carries on for another 10 years or so. Sometimes you need to come clean and discuss the issues that are at stake, if you want to see real improvement.

As I have mentioned previously, offensively we still have a wide margin separating us from the Swiss. But on the defensive side - time will tell.

I hope that we can turn it around! All of us that have voiced their concern (I assume) want to see some kind of reaction or that the issues are being addressed. In order to start working towards a goal and developing a vision, you need to acknowledge your deficiencies...
I am all for making the development program better and not getting content with our current situation, but no need to exaggerate. Czech Republic has better both current players and also prospects than Switzerland. As Rexor said, we are pretty much alone as the 6th best country with both 5th and 7th being quite far from us.

Have you recently seen some of the Swiss games in Denmark? I have basically seen all of the Swiss games and the efforts of Swiss defensemen from both NHL & NLA have been quite impressive and the very opposite of an error-prone defense.
A good defense system set by the coaching staff doesn't magically make the players better as individuals. Players like Muller or Diaz (or whoever played for the Swiss) are depth NHLers at best until they prove otherwise. I have no problem saying Swiss blueline is better, because Josi is world-class and he skews it their way, but their depth is just as bad if not worse than Czech. (And we all know how mediocre Czech D is)
 
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Voodoozz

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I've never said the Swiss are about to catch us at the 6th place, they're not. It won't happen in a foreseeable future. They are able to produce a few elite players and the Czechs have plenty of these but our depth >>>>> theirs. NLA is a good league but it's only that good because of all the import players. It's pretty entertaining to watch though, much more offensive than Extraliga i have to say.

One thing that Czechs don't have at the moment is a game breaking defenseman like Josi. I don't see any D in our prospect pool which could possibly end up being like this. We need a D like this asap.

The Czech youth hockey is definitely better than it was a few years ago but i'm not very sure it's due to system adjustments. The academies are nice and all but to me there's so much more potential with our hockey tradition. I feel like the progress in making our youngsters situation better could be much bigger.
 

Jablkon

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I was maybe too provocative when it comes to Switzerland. But I simply think we can easily sleep in and wake up behind. Thats pessimism for sure but I dont like association work and imo that causes this pessimism.

As to stats and Switzerland, they almost trippled number of NHlers in last 10 years, twice less than waht we have there if we stop trending down.

This is for sure not about Switzerland, its just all about CZ and its work. I just felt its bit of turning point here. I am curious about this year draft.
 
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Voodoozz

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So Říha will probably become the NT coach. I'm not sure what to think of it. Don't know him very well as a coach. He looks to be rather emotional, loud guy and the players respect him. If he surrounds himself with good personnel it could work imo. There was a lack of emotions/enthusiasm on the bench under Jandač and i think our guys need that.
 

Czechboy

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So Říha will probably become the NT coach. I'm not sure what to think of it. Don't know him very well as a coach. He looks to be rather emotional, loud guy and the players respect him. If he surrounds himself with good personnel it could work imo. There was a lack of emotions/enthusiasm on the bench under Jandač and i think our guys need that.
Personally... I don’t blame coach. I love my Czech hockey but our talent pool is thin... especially in net and on D. I’d argue center is a problem too. Hard to win with great wingers as everyone has great wingers.

I know nothing about Riha... hope he plays long game and keeps playing youth. No Francouz in Europe so hopefully he tries other goalies out during season as well. I am curious to see who does better in nhl next season... rittich or Francouz. Obviously I hope they both get vezina nominations along with a rebounding Mrazek.lol
 

Czechboy

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I was maybe too provocative when it comes to Switzerland. But I simply think we can easily sleep in and wake up behind. Thats pessimism for sure but I dont like association work and imo that causes this pessimism.

As to stats and Switzerland, they almost trippled number of NHlers in last 10 years, twice less than waht we have there if we stop trending down.

This is for sure not about Switzerland, its just all about CZ and its work. I just felt its bit of turning point here. I am curious about this year draft.

I had to look:

NHL.com - Stats

They have 14 guys in NHL... only 8 that played more than 50 games.... and career backup Reto Berra in net.

I think it was a beautiful run... I love what they are doing but they're not passing us soon IMO. Like someone else pointed out.. Slovakia has more medals at World Juniors, does not mean they are doing better. Or we took out Canada at U18 in quarters... which talent pool would you rather have?

Having said that... really curious how many guys we have in NHL next season... no Jagr or Vrbata.. maybe Polak and Plekanec. Sustr? Could get thin quick... hoping for our young guys to step in quickly and keep it around 30 at least.
 

lamini

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Having said that... really curious how many guys we have in NHL next season... no Jagr or Vrbata.. maybe Polak and Plekanec. Sustr? Could get thin quick... hoping for our young guys to step in quickly and keep it around 30 at least.

I think we won't go under 30...most of the guys remaining are fairly young (only Jagr, Vrbata, Plekanec, Hemsky are 32+) and our improved post 2012 drafts are slowly getting into league as well as some older UFAs
 

Jablkon

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I had to look:

NHL.com - Stats

They have 14 guys in NHL... only 8 that played more than 50 games.... and career backup Reto Berra in net.

I think it was a beautiful run... I love what they are doing but they're not passing us soon IMO. Like someone else pointed out.. Slovakia has more medals at World Juniors, does not mean they are doing better. Or we took out Canada at U18 in quarters... which talent pool would you rather have?

Having said that... really curious how many guys we have in NHL next season... no Jagr or Vrbata.. maybe Polak and Plekanec. Sustr? Could get thin quick... hoping for our young guys to step in quickly and keep it around 30 at least.

Sure sure, I maybe overreacted. But imo swiss results are products of some system. We have work ethic and imo great mentality but are our guys products of czech hockey system? Of club system yes. But when you look at swiss junior system, it is simple and clear. Our system looks like copy of some mix of Finnland, Sweden and Canada without any rationale behind it.

I mean this is imo clear advantage of Swiss hockey compare to us. Jandac did great job with building a team but it bit imo covered the fact that extraleague itself does not produce too. I mean it is maybe my wrong view but I do not remember times when you had to drill extraleague guys so much to get them on WHc level. At least, based what coaches said, they drill them a lot. But it means that you dont bring guy who can bring some value, you bring guy who can handle it.

Maybe it is a trend of hockey, but then why half of the extraleague teams play traps or defensive styles? When canadians around 2000 came here, they said all teams played same. Now its just mess. But they should realize and admit they are also partly development league. At least thats my opinion on it. Sure when you built massive quality depth, you can let the league be more like competitition for fans. But we are not there imo.

Thats where I am giving Jandac credit. He spoke about it. He mentioned Zlin and Hradec Kralove. Well Zlin is specific but did Hradec Kralove changed? No and they dont even understand what they should do. I am happy for Riha because he brings what Jandac missed and it will be decisive for our development. With him we will have tested all possible best coaches (except younger ones) and it will make jugment itself imo.
 
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Jablkon

Registered User
May 23, 2014
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Czech Republic
Three czechs in SC final after long long time. I am happy to see exactly those three guys there proving their qualities. Especially Kempny and Nosek getting to top teams from nowhere, thats impressive.
 
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Voodoozz

Czechmate
Feb 22, 2016
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Nice to see Kempny playing so well for the Caps, it seems that Quenneville didn't know how to fit him into the Blackhawks team. He's looking pretty confident out there right now, hope he gets the Cup. I also hope Jerabek will appear in the final so he can bring it to Pilsen :laugh:

BTW: I made a quick video of Pleky's NT career, loved the guy. Thought i could share it here.

 
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Jablkon

Registered User
May 23, 2014
1,693
131
Czech Republic
Nice to see Kempny playing so well for the Caps, it seems that Quenneville didn't know how to fit him into the Blackhawks team. He's looking pretty confident out there right now, hope he gets the Cup. I also hope Jerabek will appear in the final so he can bring it to Pilsen :laugh:

BTW: I made a quick video of Pleky's NT career, loved the guy. Thought i could share it here.


Nice vid and good music:)
 

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