Today it will be decided which team will take home the first national team tournament of the year.
After an intense few days, only two games remain in the Beijer Hockey Games, which is the third of four events in the Euro Hockey Tour. This week’s matches have taken place in Värmland with Karlstad as the capital and it seems to have been something that benefited Tre Kronor. Already in Thursday’s premiere, they showed a fine game where they won 4-1 against a faded Czech Republic and then it was followed up with yesterday’s victory against Switzerland, where they accounted for three goals in the power play and finally won with a comfortable 5-2.
– Good hockey game from us for about 35 minutes. Then it becomes more that we guard the lead and let down some intensity and full sharpness in our game. The last 20 minutes are just a wait for the final whistle. We want the guys to have fun on the ice and it’s hard to have fun when we do things at 70 percent, at the same time I have respect for the players, they also see what’s on the boardsaid the national team captain Sam Hallam to Aftonbladet after the match.
Although there may be late changes in the team, Tre Kronor enters today’s match with good confidence and so does Finland, who also played very well in the tournament. On Thursday, Switzerland was defeated 4-2 and in yesterday’s meeting with the Czech Republic it was a victory by the same numbers after a fine effort by the goalkeeper Lassi Lehtinen who saved 25 shots.
– The match started early and it was important to be awake straight away. It was us. It was a good team that we faced. Victory tastes very goodthe goalkeeper told Discovery after the final whistle.
Since both teams won their matches in the tournament, today’s meeting will be a pure group final where the winner wins the Beijer Hockey Games and if Sweden succeeds in that feat, they defend the title from last year. If, on the other hand, there is a Finnish victory, it will be the first time since 2018 that the tournament is won on Swedish soil. Six years ago, the tournament was played in Stockholm and a couple of months later, which made it a reprieve before the WC and where the Swedish team was reinforced with NHL stars who Mika Zibanejad and Elias Pettersson but despite that, Finland won the team’s meeting after managing to turn 0-1 to 3-1 in the third period.
The match starts at 16:00 and is broadcast on SVT2 and SVT play.
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