Jaromír Jágr dragged the club he owned to safety from relegation.
Jaromír Jágr got another professional season under his belt. PDO
Ice hockey legend Jaromír Jágr joined Rytíři Kladno, the club he owned in the middle of the season, to save it from distress.
Kladno was plagued by a wave of illness in December and the players started to run low. The 51-year-old Jágr put on his skates and played in the team’s shirt for the rest of the season.
Kladno ended up in a relegation playoff against HC Zlín. In the end, Kladno did not show much mercy to its opponent, but kept its place in the Czech premier league even next season. Kladno won the qualifying series with match wins 4–0.
Jágr finally played 26 regular season games and scored 5+9 power points in them. The qualifying series was unsuccessful.
Jágr said he still enjoys hockey.
– It’s just that preparing for games is no longer the case of coming to the venue and playing for 15 minutes. And sometimes goes to practice. At my age, additional training is needed, which takes much more time than I can give. Sometimes it takes a whole day to prepare for one match. Then you think that you could do much more important things, Jágr said in Czech of iSport in the interview.
Will the puck career continue then? For that, Jágr sets one condition.
– It mainly depends on whether I am ready to play in training matches, whether I participate in them or not. If I miss them, I don’t want to jump into the locker room during the season. I don’t think I would have played at all this year if we had had a virus wave in December. I wouldn’t do it again, I might not play at all.
Kladno didn’t have enough players even in training amid the illnesses.
– Paradoxically, the viral wave helped me come back. And I started to enjoy it because there was a break and I could train hard. I slowly got involved. If I don’t take part in training matches in the summer, it’s difficult to come back after that.
Jágr’s professional career started already in 1988. During his playing career, he has won, among other things, twice the Stanley Cup, two World Cup golds and one Olympic gold. There are also a lot of personal prizes in the prize locker.