How do lines work in Liiga?

[Rossm]

Hi all!

I've recently been following some games, via watching the scores come in only and it brought up a question for me.

Quite often a player will score, and they will be assisted by players from different lines (first line assisting 3rd for example).

What causes this? Are the lines flexible during a game?

It also looks to me like the defensive players are included in the lines as well, based on the lineups I've seen. Do they often rotate as a 5 or do the defensive and offensive lines rotate seperately, causing 3rd offensive line to pair up with 1st defensive line for example?

Lastly I can find absolutely no information on power play lines. Do teams have power play lines during matches? Or do they just continue to play with whoever is currently playing?

Thanks for the help!

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[Yellow and the green]

To my understanding liiga clubs have 5v4 and 4v5 lines also coaches will sometimes promote players that are on fire during a match. Also many of these 3rd line player assisting 1st line player can be caused of delayed offensives or injuries

 

[Rossm]

To my understanding liiga clubs have 5v4 and 4v5 lines also coaches will sometimes promote players that are on fire during a match. Also many of these 3rd line player assisting 1st line player can be caused of delayed offensives or injuries

Thanks for the reply!

Ah I see, that makes sense. Would you say that the first and second line players are the one's that play the most? It seems to me like the good players are split across different lines more than they would in the NHL for example!

 

[Yellow and the green]

Thanks for the reply!

Ah I see, that makes sense. Would you say that the first and second line players are the one's that play the most? It seems to me like the good players are split across different lines more than they would in the NHL for example!

I see that in sm-liiga you wanna balance your lines lot more. For example last game Ilves was againts Lukko and the defending lines for the first 2 lines were Peltomäki/Elorinne and Salmela/Parikka. Parikka is the best defender in Ilves and most fans agree that Salmela is way better than Peltomäki but it is better to have balanced lines than one stacked line.

Also i think that Joose Antonen is way better than Meskanen but there have been rumours about Antonen having disputes with the head coach so he is in 4th line. But to answer your question properly 1st and 2st line players usually play the most but don't never count someone out for being 4th liner