High level of play as such, but also an excessively high number of higher penalties until the end of the match. It was enough to play the first two rounds and the hockey extra league documents exactly what was said. It’s a lot, besides the strong three Sparta, Pardubice, Třinec you will find 11 ambitious teams eager for the playoffs. Not at least in the preliminary round? It doesn’t exist! And the events on the battlefield correspond to this. It started from the floor. “I associate so many high penalties with extreme pressure on results and points,” admits Zbyněk Irgl, a former well-known striker and now an expert on the Zimák podcast on the iSport.cz website and www.zimakpodcast.cz.
Bohumil Janko from Třinec was given a five-minute penalty before the end of the match by the referees, Pavol Skalický from Mladá Boleslav, as well as Pardubice defender Andrej Šustr, Vítkovice defender Patrik Marcel and Hradec Hradec striker Ryan Dmowski.
Twice it was a blow to the head and neck, once a blow to the head, then an assault and slashing in the groin. “I don’t remember it ever starting like this, but it’s just about the fact that teams absolutely have to start the season well, because whoever doesn’t catch the beginning can have a bad time. There are teams with zero on their account, and if they should still have it after Sunday’s round, panic will break out. Apart from the first three or four, enormous pressure comes from the club managers towards the cabin from the first moment,” says Zbyněk Irgl. “Look at Olomouc, they lost twice, and if they don’t get a point in Vítkovice on Sunday, things can happen.”
It was from the Vítkovice camp that a crude barrier fell on the head of the Liberec attacker Martin Ryšavý. It was the fault of the strong back Patrik Marcel, who spotted the opponent behind the home goal and knocked him hard to the ground with a shoulder to the head.
For Ryšavý, it was a collision with a truck from the other lane. No wonder it took him a while to recover. “I got hit directly in the head from a blind angle, my head hurts, I was a little shocked after the impact, but I felt that I was able to finish the match, which was the main thing for me,” he described after Friday’s fight.
Many wondered if it was just a coincidence. Ryšavý played for Vítkovice before he left for the Canadian junior team. They let it be known that they were interested in Ryšavý’s return, but the player vehemently denied it, saying that he was not in contact with anyone from the management. And he heard the call of Liberec.
He didn’t want to speculate about the background of Marcel’s switch. “It happened so quickly that I prefer not to evaluate it. And I wouldn’t want to go back to what was discussed in the summer,” responded the 21-year-old fighter, who quickly settled in with the Tigers.
He just doesn’t get scared of anything. And so, after treatment, he went back into action. “You have to be careful with concussions, they examined me, checked me, asked me how I felt. It’s nice that it wasn’t worse and I don’t have to stop right at the beginning of the season.”
Paradoxically, he scored after Marcelo’s attack. “But I’m sorry that we didn’t make it to the winning end,” added Ryšavý to the 2:4 defeat.
- General Play-offs
- Generali Play-off preliminary round
- Barrage
