Thanks for that. I think the problem is that interest in hockey in Britain is largely non-existent. Even kids who are interested in the sport don't really have anywhere to play because there's no training or kids leagues. I guess they have to focus on imports or there just wouldn't be enough players otherwise. It probably doesn't even qualify as a fringe sport. It's a massive shame really.
I completely agree and it's a sad thing to think about.
There aren't enough ice rinks and all ice rinks favour public skating events over ice hockey lessons and training. Then there's all of the figure skating, curling and speed skating which also eats away at available ice time.
These days I think most kids are lucky to get an hour session twice a week max, and that tends to be organised and run by kids' parents or semi-professional players looking to make a few extra quid. Varies upon location of course but considering juniors in Scandinavia tend to get a few hours ice time per day, with proper systems in place for off ice training, reputable coaches with vast experience, very well structured junior leagues and progression.. It's no surprise that the UK is completely stuck at the bottom of a pit.
The British Junior Leagues are quite awful. u15, u18 and u20's. 20 games per 'season' in the Juniors which isn't enough. Most of the decent quality youngsters end up playing in both their regular age group and the one above, because they play so few games and need the ice time if they want to develop. They are usually more than good enough too as well which takes away the challenge you'd generally associate with a 14 year old playing against 18 years olds. More often than not each age group will have one or two teams which will just obliterate the others. Cardiff Devils u15's is a prime example, they play in the u15's D1 South. They're one of the junior teams for the reigning double champions, in the season just gone they won 1 out of 20 and conceded 204 goals to the 25 that they scored. Chelmsford, Guildford and Slough battled well for the title with only 5pts separating them. But after the top few, the rest are absolutely miles off the pace. It's the same in the u18's too, Bracknell Drones in the u18 D1 South also had just 1 win in 20, conceding 145 and scoring 55, whilst Okanagan led the division with 18 wins, 1 loss, scoring 158 over the 20 games.
Once these kids have aged out of the u20's, the only places for them to continue playing and developing is NIHL2, NIHL or the EIHL. Universities have their leagues but the quality is quite poor and the gap between decent teams and not so good teams is horrendous.
Junior development in the UK is a lottery in its current state. Liam Kirk is the abnormality in the system. How he has developed to become an NHL Draftee is incredible but shocking, never in a million years would people think the current state of British Juniors would be able to produce such a capable player.
EIHL teams must join forces with an NIHL team, and together they need to be the parent teams of junior teams which are both funded and coached by the parent clubs. Cardiff Devils u15's getting absolutely mullered is ridiculous. The EIHL cannot survive on imports along for the long run. We need British players, we need good quality British players for both the domestic side and the international side. I'm glad there's a fair few kids jumping over to North America and Scandinavia to boost their development but I hope to see one day in the future, a clean cut, good quality development system in our own nation.
Sadly it does usually come down to funding and there are very very few people who are willing to invest in ice hockey in the UK. I hope that changes but I'm not holding my breath. We need to use the inspiration of Liam Kirk to just say, 'to hell with all the politics' and go all in on creating good junior development systems.
