Finland left for Beijing as a bigger gold favorite than Tampere, writes Lassi Kuisma.
Sakari Manninen shows no signs of clotting in the national team. On Sunday, Manninen scored two goals. EPA / AOP
The World Championship of Lions was not a work of art from Finland, as Sweden won 4–3, and the field events would not have justified a different result. Sweden also won the finish line.
Finland lost as many as four of their last preparatory matches. It was preceded by a winning streak of 15 matches. But no win or loss in itself shakes the pre-World Cup standings in any direction. The lions have been at the forefront of the international puck since spring 2019, and many argue that Finland is one of the biggest gold medal favorites at the Games.
However, some question marks were raised by the EHT games.
When the Lions won Olympic gold in Beijing, the defense was a priority over the others. The words of head coach Jukka Jalonen before the Olympic finals were remembered.
– Someone thinks there will be more goal spots in a small trough, but it’s easier to break than to build.
The premise was that the opponent’s goal points must be kept to a minimum. Unlike, for example, at the 2019 World Cup, this was often done with a close defense game in one’s own area instead of long own attacks. So this was the puck that Rene Fasel, the former IIHF boss who had completely destroyed his reputation in recent years, found.
However, the World Cup will be played in the big trough and opponents may be of better quality than the Olympic trough, as there are now NHL players involved as well. So it’s interesting to see how well the Lions manage to keep their opponent’s finish points to a minimum in the World Cup.
On Sunday at Globen, the Swedish game was no longer so easy to break. A good example of this was seen in the last minute of the first set, when the teams played four against four. So there was plenty of space. Finland did try to defend the goal carefully, but only the skilled Swedish defenders Henrik Tömmernes and Rasmus Dahlin fed the hole in Finland and Dahlin got a blank goal. Sweden thus had a situation where the pass between the two defenders (!) Went between the four players on the Finnish field and the goalkeeper.
When Finland then attacked in Beijing, it had enough skill to create places. In addition, Lions was the most powerful team in the tournament. Finland was very careful and smart in its support of goal scoring. Finland scored the most goals in Beijing, with a total of 22 goals. Final opponent Russia’s readings were 14 goals, 190 shots and 7.37 percent.
After all, the goals of the Lions in Beijing were therefore very simple probabilities. If you create more goals than your opponent and are still effective in those of your own places, there is a good chance of winning.
However, in the games preparing for the World Cup, the Lions’ offensive game has not yet convinced. One thing still hasn’t changed. Lions from Sakari Manninen, Teemu Hartikainen and Harri Pesone will receive important help in the attacking head.
Well, EHT games are EHT games. As the World Cup begins, the Lions will turn numbers and probabilities into more favorable ones.
The starting block of the World Championships is more than twice as long as the Olympics, where three first-round games were played. In the first block of Tampere, the lions will forge money at the box office of the race organization in seven matches played at the Nokia Arena. As long as the Lions do not stumble into Latvia, Norway, Great Britain or Austria, it will reach the semi-finals, at which point the game must be in order at the latest.
This supports one of the Lions ’great skills: tournament coaching. The lion coaching line does not work on the time card. The Finnish coaching management is probably rewinding the videos more than many opponents and is trying to learn what needs to be fixed and what works.
The evening paper outlined ahead of the Beijing Olympics that the Lions ’seam in Olympic gold is better than ever before and that the team is Russia’s biggest favorite.
Now the situation is that Russia is out of the races, but other opponents like the Czech Republic, the US and Canada are tougher than in February.
Indeed, it seems that Lions is a gold favorite, but not as big as in Beijing.