Actually, it probably was. Radunske and Keller weren't citizens of those countries before they went to play there, you have to be a citizen to represent a team in IIHF competition, for most countries the residency requirement for citizenship ranges between 4-6 years. So they played pretty much right after they acquired citizenship and became eligible.
Well, still, it was about getting a citizenship and not just IIHF rules. These countries didn't just give out citizenship because some fella could help their hockey team.
I don't know where is the problem with foreginers in croatian team. They fullifield criteria for playing in Croatian NT and everything is legal. I really do hope for more foreginers in upcoming years. Thank God with KHL in town choice is very deep.
I never said it was illegal. Even you consider those players foreigners. So what is exactly the point of having a NATIONAL TEAM with foreigners on it? The real problem, however, isn't even that. The problem is that bunch of Canadians playing for poor hockey countries
can keep a real hockey countries down even though they don't contribute anything to the sport and don't reflect what the state of hockey there is. If the goal of the national team's tournament becomes to convince as many Canadians as possible to play for that team 1) how it is a national team's tournament? and 2) how is it hockey tournament if diplomacy or I don't know how to call this is as big of a part? It's not like Poland of The Netherlands couldn't play it this way but how would it benefit anyone?
it's ridiculous that players have the freedom to play for who they actually want to play for instead of having national identity forced on them? what are you, a communist?
if anything, the rules are too strict. if I identify as Irish, it shouldn't matter if I've actually played hockey on Irish soil or not. or even have citizenship as long as I have ethnic heritage.
That's just comical. What I am saying is basically the opposite of communist doctrine and whole political left meanwhile what you're saying is extremely left-ish so actually you are one step away from being (or at least thinking like) textbook communist and I don't even think that's such a bad thing.
I guess I just blew your mind, didn't I?
However, you talk about heritage and national identity here, that's fine. But tell me, how, for example, Kevin Dallman playing for Kazakhstan has anything to do with it? He's not Kazakh, he has no heritage there whatsoever, he doesn't live or play there, he doesn't care for the country enough to play in "unimportant matches" like World Championship (and I have strong feeling he got paid for the ones he actually played in at the OGQ) and his wife just flat out hates it. How about those cases?
I really don't know if it would be such a great idea for international hockey if Canadians and Americans who aren't quite good enough for the NHL or AHL, but better than 95% of the players in the Division I and II nations, start playing for their ethnic heritage countries.
That's almost exactly my point except that I'm ok with people with ethnic heritage playing for them. However, whole lot of those players have nothing to do with that country whatsoever.
He sounds to me more like a racist.
And I agree that rules are too strict, for example Kostovic and Zanoski both born in Croatia and they still needed to play two years for Medvescak to get their NT "rights".
Doesn't a whole concept of national team sound racist for you, then?
However, I must say, this has nothing to do with race, racism of even nationalism of any kind. It's simply about fairness and general principle of the thing. How is it fair for other legit hockey nations in Div. IB when some country with 2 (3?) hockey rinks and a bunch of Canadians (not Canadians with Croatian heritage or something, just simple Geoffs Waughs of the world) would get a promotion to Div. IA basically just because they have an EBEL (KHL now) team and loose nationality laws unlike them?
For all you "he's a communist racist nazi whatever" guys, if you think this is about national identity or something just give your head a shake. It's about hockey. And I don't think IIHF has to do something here. In this case, there really can't be any ideal solution. Some guys legitimately deserve the right to play for other countries than the ones they are forced to play for. However others (both players and countries) just take an advantage of this system for a personal gain of some kind. At least that's how I feel.
