WJC: Finland Coaching Staff Fired Mid-Tournament. Jussi Ahokas Now Coaching

[Tulipunaruusu*]

We should look at junior age group masses if something

If they are quite even in numbers doesn't it say that Sweden is quite good benchmark for Finland? So Finnish golden age gets the proper frame if there are only two better Scandinavian ice hockey counties before it: Sweden and Denmark in quality produced.

 

[QnebO]

If they are quite even in numbers doesn't it say that Sweden is quite good benchmark for Finland?

It is, but population will always count too, though. Doesn't higher population give a country higher chance to pull gifted, "freak of nature" type person that then selects a sport named hockey with some likelyhood..

Sweden has more population and higher chance of those very gifted persons. Finland cuts their lead a bit in popularity of hockey, as hockey will still receive about as much players as Finland because of that, claim some.

I still disagree though. In Finland, While no one follows football compared to hockey from tv and such, actually football has more players than hockey. Hockey is not biggest sport in terms of amounts of players, I have seen this put out so many times, Im not going to search for sources. Hockey is expensive sport and while it's most popular to watch, it's not most played one.

Btw what has denmark to do with this? I aknowledge their raise and that they're solid hockey nation already, but they're not our benchmark, not yet at least.

 

[BusQuets]

It is, but population will always count too, though. Doesn't higher population give a country higher chance to pull gifted, "freak of nature" type person that then selects a sport named hockey with some likelyhood..

Sweden has more population and higher chance of those very gifted persons. Finland cuts their lead a bit in popularity of hockey, as hockey will still receive about as much players as Finland because of that, claim some.

I still disagree though. In Finland, While no one follows football compared to hockey from tv and such, actually football has more players than hockey. Hockey is not biggest sport in terms of amounts of players, I have seen this put out so many times, Im not going to search for sources. Hockey is expensive sport and while it's most popular to watch, it's not most played one.

Btw what has denmark to do with this? I aknowledge their raise and that they're solid hockey nation already, but they're not our benchmark, not yet at least.

Yeah this is true. Football has over 130000 registered players in Finland and it's actually growing quite rapidly. The cost of hockey is going to be one of the biggest hurdles for the sport in whole.

 

[mazmin]

The size of the population is irrelevant argument. India and China would be top nations if only size of the population matters.

I can count the hockey programs in China and India on one hand. Mentioning these nations in a hockey discussion is irrelevant.

 

[mazmin]

Finland actually has more registered hockey players than Sweden.
Finland 74 000
Sweden 60 000
http://www.iihf.com/iihf-home/the-iihf/survey-of-players/

From what I've read these stats are misleading since the definition of "registered hockey player" is different from country to country.

The major hockey nations are Canada, USA, Russia, Czech, Slovakia, Sweden and Finland. Any other nation isn't worth discussing at this time since they're nowhere near the big 7. From these I think it's very relevant to look at country population vs. top players produced and international team success.

When looking at these variables, Finland is one of the best. Sweden is extremely good as well. Russia and USA would be least successful per capita, albeit for very different reasons.