Finland isn't going well

Faktisti*

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That is not correct. Here are the official stats from the IIHF:

http://www.iihf.com/iihf/member/Survey of players.pdf


Finland has 60811 registered players, while Russia has 77202 registered players. Finland has 220 hockey rinks and Russia has only 142 hockey rinks(!).

So if you look at these numbers there is no reason for Finland to produce less skilled players than Russia.

For the comparison's sake North America has an overwhelming edge over the Europe in hockey resources. Canada has 552404 registered hockey players and 3000 hockey rinks. USA has 453299 registered hockey players and 1800 hockey rinks.



THIS IS WHERE PEOPLE GO WRONG!
there are mayby pretty as much register players in finland than in russia. BUT in russia they take just the most talented players and the others wont have a change to play hockey. in the other words there are 77000 very talented players in russia and mayby 10000 very talented finnish players. the junior programs are so different in russia
 

Faktisti*

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AND finland is such a big country if u compare finlands size and population, and there are not much poor people so its impossible to have that kind of junior developing system than its in russia
 

Peter25

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Sep 20, 2003
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1) Theres a lot more hockey players in russia that are out of the system.

Do you know this for a fact? Where is the proof? Do they play organized hockey in some frozen swamps in Russia?


Its quite possibly the poorest country per capita in all of the hockey nations and thus "registered" players are probably a bad figure to look at.

What does Russia's GDP/capita have to do with the real figure of hockey players? I would actually think its the other way around. Poor people can't buy the expensive hockey equipment for their children. I would think there are more unregistered hockey players in countries like Canada and Finland than in Russia.



2) The rinks number only count the number of arenas, in Russia(finland as well), like in Canada its possible to play hockey outside an arena for many months.

Yes, and same holds true for Sweden and Finland as well.
 

Faktisti*

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as i said those 77000 hockey players are all super prospects, the best juniors. what comes to finland i can gues that there is something like 10000 real prospects and the others are only some amateurs
 

SneakerPimp82

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Apr 5, 2003
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Regarding creative finnish forwards, no love for Juha-Matti Aaltonen? From what I've seen(online videos) and what the Finnish fans say, he's very creative.
 

Faktisti*

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Regarding creative finnish forwards, no love for Juha-Matti Aaltonen? From what I've seen(online videos) and what the Finnish fans say, he's very creative.


he's very valuable for his team, but isnt e real star even in sm-liiga. from the same team there is also janne pesonen whose next destination could be the NHL. he's 24 years old ''only''. he is very creativy player

this is a list of finns who are creativy and who play in europe:

jari viuhkola/ kärpät
janne pesonen/kärpät
juha-matti aaltonen/kärpät
ville leino/hpk
kristian kuusela/ässät
petri kontiola/tappara
perttu lingren/ilves
mikko lehtonen/blues
kimmo kuhta/hifk
sami lepistö(D)/jokerit
kim hirschovits/jokerit
anssi salmela(D)/pelicans
marko kiprusoff(old veteran, miikka's brother)/tps

tomi kallio/frölunda
pasi puistola(D)/hv71
janne niskala(D)/färjestad (50 points in 50 games, pretty good when ur defender)
timo pärssinen/timrå
esa pirnes/färjestad

toni söderholm/bern
kimmo rintanen/kloten

allmost everybody are young players, these are the first ones who i remembered right now
 

nanzenkills

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Jan 31, 2007
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I think these things are cyclical, like others have suggested. 2007 and 2008 look like weak years for Finland as far as draft-eligible prospects go, but so far, 2009 looks really good.
 

Ola

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Apr 10, 2004
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I think all countries are faced with a cyclic development, look at sweden, they have been producing quite poor talents for 6-7 years and recently they have been great. Sure it shows less for the big powers of hockey, because theres so many players produced per year, but still they have their weak years.(Like this year.) Canada is in good shape for 2008 and 2009 draft, but 2007 is poor to say the least.

Yeah, especially compared to the extremely good period before that, Lidas, Foppa, Sundin, Alfie and Näslund within less then a handful of years.

In Sweden there is also a enhanced down effect, since Hockey by a pretty big marginal is behind two other sports. If thoose two other sports go well at the same time as we kind of hit low on the cycle Sweden suddenly dropps behind Swiss in WJC like we did there for a while.

A great crop also causes allot of competition within the country, and that is always great. If Forsberg didn't have Näslund, and Näslund didn't have Forsberg, I doubt either of them would have become the best or almost the best. Forsberg writes in his book how extremely dissapointed he was when Näslund got a chance with the men's team when he was left in the stands selling gameguides. If it weren't for Näslund, Forsberg probably would have been pretty satisfied, now he only was the 2nd best player on his junior team...

I think Sweden became a bit lazy after that. So many kids became mega stars, so the best kids we developed after that thought they atleast would have become stars in the NHL as long as they where the best in Sweden, many of the top players of thoose generations didn't even make the SEL.
 

Ola

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Apr 10, 2004
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EXACTLY!

i do also blame that damn junior program called nuori suomi. it really sucks! and i also blame kalervo kummola. in the year 1988 borned and older are all that what NUORI SUOMI has made: any player hasnt any strong skills. the talented players plays against not so talented players, coaches think only about winning, not about making creativy players like russians. too much physical training, too less talent. and the worst thing is the coaches dont motivate players to develop their skills and tricks. if u do mistake, then u gona pay for that, but the point is that if u wont do mistakes, u wont be a good player!

and if u can, read this:

http://www.urheilulehti.fi/jaakiekko/uutiset/article140552-1.html

Whats nuori suomi and whats it about?
 

Ola

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Apr 10, 2004
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2) The rinks number only count the number of arenas, in Russia(finland as well), like in Canada its possible to play hockey outside an arena for many months.

Yeah, thougt about that too. I am from the far north of Sweden, litterary less then a slapshot from the Finnish border, and there its possible to play outdoors, in both countrys of course. But very few people live up there in the north. These days with the climate getting warmer very kids in both Sweden and Finland got a opertunity to play outdoors for longer then maybe a few weeks, and with "the season" that short the citys have pretty much stopped to prep the ice on the outdoor rinks.

In Russia allot more people live were its possible to play outside.

THIS IS WHERE PEOPLE GO WRONG!
there are mayby pretty as much register players in finland than in russia. BUT in russia they take just the most talented players and the others wont have a change to play hockey. in the other words there are 77000 very talented players in russia and mayby 10000 very talented finnish players. the junior programs are so different in russia

Yeah, a huge majority of the Russian stars comes out of their top programs, hand picked kids who there are spent a ton of resources on. Like AO, Ovechkin, Malkin and co.
 

SOLR

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Jun 4, 2006
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Do you know this for a fact? Where is the proof? Do they play organized hockey in some frozen swamps in Russia?

What does Russia's GDP/capita have to do with the real figure of hockey players? I would actually think its the other way around. Poor people can't buy the expensive hockey equipment for their children. I would think there are more unregistered hockey players in countries like Canada and Finland than in Russia.


No money, no organization, thats often the case wont you say? Everyone playing hockey in Canada is accounted for because not only theres coach, rinks, equipment, theres also a whole range of middlemans, hockey organisms, scouts etc. All of this comes because we are a rich country imo. Its the same in the US. No players of 50+ or 5 years old is forgotten.


Yes, and same holds true for Sweden and Finland as well.

yep like I said, all the real hockey nations have some snow in the winter. I expect Japan and China to develop into good hockey nations over time. Korea might as well.
 

Ola

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Apr 10, 2004
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Can't say that I am a expert on Finnish hockey, but I do belive that the decision to close the SM-liiga have had a big negative impact. The SM-liiga have gotten much worse, and the 2nd tier league have become less competetive.

It takes away so much pressure in the systems. The first couple of years it payed off, but now it defenitly seems like its gooing the other way. I think its a little bit too easy for a young kid to establish himself in the SM-liiga, you get a long way on just beeing fast.

When the SM-liiga was better, at times maybe the best outside the NHL, a young kid who wanted to make it to the NHL had to work darn hard.
 

Mogo

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Like I said years ago Finnish hockey will be in big trouble once the S.Koivu generation retire. Finland will be battling to stay in A group in WC

As for SM liiga. It has become horrible. I'd rank them 6th or even lower among all leagues. In the 90's many said it was the 2nd best league in the world now it's just horrible. I havent followed finnish junior hockey programs since I retired (Tuomo Ruutu age group) but I hear who still are involved in it that it's rotten and nothing close to what it was 5+ years ago.
 

Ola

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Like I said years ago Finnish hockey will be in big trouble once the S.Koivu generation retire. Finland will be battling to stay in A group in WC

As for SM liiga. It has become horrible. I'd rank them 6th or even lower among all leagues. In the 90's many said it was the 2nd best league in the world now it's just horrible. I havent followed finnish junior hockey programs since I retired (Tuomo Ruutu age group) but I hear who still are involved in it that it's rotten and nothing close to what it was 5+ years ago.

Have the interest gone down or what?

As for the SM-liiga, I wrote about that on this board like 2 years ago, of course only was accused to be a Finland hater ect.

Though it just aren't good. I just look at the stats, so many of the top scorers just aren't that good.

Another problem is the direction on the ice in terms of systems that Finland have choosen. They are one of the most straight forward, gooing hard to the net, hockey country there is, almost more so then Canada.

Despite making the finals in the WC and Olympics, I don't belive in that at all. Finnish hockey had a ton of success when Curre Lundmark came into Finnish hockey, before that you guys played a real offensive brand of hockey, for our canadian friends think the QJMHL of Europe, and Lundmark added a defensive aspect to that and won allot. After that I think you guys have become far to Canada inspired, it works if you got the biggest and fastsest players, but ought to be, on paper atleast, doomed to fail for a small country. We must be smarter.
 
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Faktisti*

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Can't say that I am a expert on Finnish hockey, but I do belive that the decision to close the SM-liiga have had a big negative impact. The SM-liiga have gotten much worse, and the 2nd tier league have become less competetive.

It takes away so much pressure in the systems. The first couple of years it payed off, but now it defenitly seems like its gooing the other way. I think its a little bit too easy for a young kid to establish himself in the SM-liiga, you get a long way on just beeing fast.

When the SM-liiga was better, at times maybe the best outside the NHL, a young kid who wanted to make it to the NHL had to work darn hard.


I dont think that is the reason of everything, look how big are those ''playing-ices'' in europe. it doesnt matter if its locked or opened league, u still need only speed to be a good player in europe, of course your skills will be seen more easily also.

anyways when u look sweden's elitserien, usee there are 40-50 finnish players so u cant say that finns can only skate fast, or elitserien is better than sm-liiga..

if finns can make it to the top in elitserien, swedish players cant be much better
 

Faktisti*

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something must do to finnish hokcey, but i wouldnt say its better junior working in sweden..

your best players forsberg, lidström, sundin, näslund and alfredson are all pretty old and wont play very long anymore.

i wouldnt say Zetterberg is so good. he reads game well but he isnt as talented as many russian players or finnish olli jokinen, thats my opinion.

and bad thing in your league is that every good player is from finland, or Czech and when every team has 8-14 players from other countries juniors wont get good changes. bäckström is one not of those
 

SOLR

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Jun 4, 2006
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something must do to finnish hokcey, but i wouldnt say its better junior working in sweden..

your best players forsberg, lidström, sundin, näslund and alfredson are all pretty old and wont play very long anymore.

i wouldnt say Zetterberg is so good. he reads game well but he isnt as talented as many russian players or finnish olli jokinen, thats my opinion.

and bad thing in your league is that every good player is from finland, or Czech and when every team has 8-14 players from other countries juniors wont get good changes. bäckström is one not of those

Sedins? They are exploding in vancouver.
Backstrom+all of this year, backlund, moller, andersson
Hedman in 2009

Theres a lot of high profile prospect coming out of sweden now and in the 1-2 next years.
 

Savolainen

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Oct 10, 2005
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Like I said years ago Finnish hockey will be in big trouble once the S.Koivu generation retire. Finland will be battling to stay in A group in WC

As for SM liiga. It has become horrible. I'd rank them 6th or even lower among all leagues. In the 90's many said it was the 2nd best league in the world now it's just horrible. I havent followed finnish junior hockey programs since I retired (Tuomo Ruutu age group) but I hear who still are involved in it that it's rotten and nothing close to what it was 5+ years ago.

Well, battling to stay in A group will not happen... We played enough very good tournaments without the players of this genaration and there is enough talent in finnish hockey!
 

Phenomenon

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Jun 10, 2006
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Agreed. Something is really wrong in the Finnish player production.

The good thing is that our goalie coaching and scouting seems to be world class, but elsewhere we are lacking the ability to produce the gems. Maybe it is time for us to admit that we should really adjust our league or something, so that our best youngsters get enough icetime and responsibility. No more Lauris Darzins like foreign players, please.
 

Faktisti*

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Whats nuori suomi and whats it about?

its a program where every junior hockey player can get as much playing time in matches. every player will be same about their skills. coaches dont develop players strong points, but weak points
 

Korkki

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Mar 6, 2002
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The "Nuori Suomi" program in this form sucks. It should be changed alot. But there are also good points so I won't drop out the whole program.

The maximum age should be lowered to 12 (younger junior D) and on younger junior C level (14) and older junior D level (13 years old) there should be Championship serie like in older junior C level. These competitions should apply every age group, not like junior B or A which consists of two age groups.

Tackling and shooting should be allowed on older E level. I know there are different sized boys but there is also a big role on referee to take out the charging and others which are outside the rules.

And I think that there is something to learn from football. There are skill schools and that kind of things for players who are more willing to learn more. I know that it is an icetime problem, but what prevents boys to practise at morning on 1-3 times a week. Moms perhaps?

And what is the most important point... More matches. I know it is also a cost point, but I think that it is the most effective way back to the top.

Nevertheless. A year ago Finland had a silver in Olympics and medals in both U20 and U18. So what really is the problem?
 

TK79

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That is not correct. Here are the official stats from the IIHF:

http://www.iihf.com/iihf/member/Survey of players.pdf


Finland has 60811 registered players, while Russia has 77202 registered players. Finland has 220 hockey rinks and Russia has only 142 hockey rinks(!).

So if you look at these numbers there is no reason for Finland to produce less skilled players than Russia.

For the comparison's sake North America has an overwhelming edge over the Europe in hockey resources. Canada has 552404 registered hockey players and 3000 hockey rinks. USA has 453299 registered hockey players and 1800 hockey rinks.

Wow, these figures are quite a suprise for me. However, you have to take into account that the talent pool among 145 million people is quite a bit larger than among 5 million people. Also Russia is quite a bit poorer than Finland, meaning only those who are good enough (or have the financial means to) can play hockey. In Finland this "Nuori Suomi" ideology really does kill top level talent, even it is good for the average player. I remember when I was playing basketball as a junior player, the rules stated that every player had to sit out one quarter of the game, so everyone got to play. This was until we were 14 or 15.
 
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Ola

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I dont think that is the reason of everything, look how big are those ''playing-ices'' in europe. it doesnt matter if its locked or opened league, u still need only speed to be a good player in europe, of course your skills will be seen more easily also.

anyways when u look sweden's elitserien, usee there are 40-50 finnish players so u cant say that finns can only skate fast, or elitserien is better than sm-liiga..

if finns can make it to the top in elitserien, swedish players cant be much better

There are many fantastic Finnish hockeyplayers, I never said something else. Though in the SM-liiga, they are quite few! ;)

It doesn't have a major impact, but I got a theory, that I've had for 2-3 years, and that is that its too easy to for Finnish kids right now to establish themselfs as decent offensive players in the SM-liiga, without breaking any swet. If that would be harder, they would be pushed more to develop there offense.

Take Mikko Koivu for example. A pretty big talent. Though he wheren't that good when he scored 20 pts in 37 games as a 19 y/o. Just making it to the SM-Liigaa is a big goal for a young kid, something you aim at, the kids today in Finland are aiming a little low.

If the SM-liiga was the best league in Europe Mikko Koivu would have been forced allot harder just to make TPS. Once a regular he would have been forced to work harder again just to become someone who contributed.
 

Faktisti*

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There are many fantastic Finnish hockeyplayers, I never said something else. Though in the SM-liiga, they are quite few! ;)

It doesn't have a major impact, but I got a theory, that I've had for 2-3 years, and that is that its too easy to for Finnish kids right now to establish themselfs as decent offensive players in the SM-liiga, without breaking any swet. If that would be harder, they would be pushed more to develop there offense.

Take Mikko Koivu for example. A pretty big talent. Though he wheren't that good when he scored 20 pts in 37 games as a 19 y/o. Just making it to the SM-Liigaa is a big goal for a young kid, something you aim at, the kids today in Finland are aiming a little low.

If the SM-liiga was the best league in Europe Mikko Koivu would have been forced allot harder just to make TPS. Once a regular he would have been forced to work harder again just to become someone who contributed.


mayby true, good opinion, but remember that in sm-liiga, there doesnt play very much players from other countries, like in elitserien , which might be the best leagua after NHL, or russian league. so the level of games is higher and the big reason of that is absolutely good players from countries like Canada, Czech etc.. of course there are also good swedish players, im sure agree with that..

sm-liiga isnt the best league of europe, but it should be able to produce gems, because there is foreigner contingent. but at this moment, i really think that sm-liiga hasnt..
 

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