Unlike the qualification tournament four years ago I don't feel AS disappointed this year - still disappointed though. Four years ago I felt we deserved the victory, and I thought we were clearly the better team. Watching these two matches this year it becomes painfully obvious that when playing without our NHL'ers the Danish team is mediocree at best with scrubs from tier-2 Sweden as our go-to-guys. We simply aren't better than what this result justifies. We saw it at the last WC and we're seeing it now. Playing at the Olympics would be awesome, but it could very quickly become a humiliating experience whenever Frans, Philip, Bødker and Jannik are taking breathers.
I don't know about Bäckman - what other options did he have? Denmark is always better with our backs against the wall. We haven't been used to being favorites or controlling the matches in the last ten years. To me it seemed the players were motivated but underestimated the opposition in some way.
Yesterday we shot wide from 3 meters away 7 times at least, fanned on the pucks, moved the puck slowly and wanted to dangle the entire Slovenian team at all times. Defensively we were not great but at least kept them at two, and that should give you all chances of winning. Offensively is where we struggle, and as I said that is a result of suddenly needing to control the matches rather than stay put and await.
