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The hockey players of HK Dukla Ingem Michalovce have a surprise within reach. After four play-off matches, Tipos extraliga lead over Slovan Bratislava 3:1 on matches and are only one win away from an unexpected promotion.
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VIDEO: Slovan is on the verge of disaster. Michalovce have the defending champion on the shovel
“The last step awaits us, which is usually the most difficult. We must continue our hard work and team determination,” noted coach Peter Kudelka.
Michalovský’s team got into an advantageous position after winning both home matches on Tuesday and Wednesday, and they can decide on the promotion already on Friday in Bratislava. The series was initially developed according to “paper” assumptions.
Slovan won the first match 5:2, but then lost at home in overtime. Michalovce took the lead in the series after winning the first home match, when they won 2:1 after a successful free kick by Vadim Pereskokov in overtime.
The fourth duel of the series did not develop according to the ideas of Michaloviec coach Petr Kudelka. After Roman Žitno, the latter also lost another attacker, Matúš Paloček, whose injury prematurely ended the season.
“Belasí” took the lead with a quick goal in the 2nd minute, when Roman Kukumberg Jr. made his debut in the extra league. However, that was all from Slovan and only the home side scored further. “We had a weaker start. The opponent dominated it, and thanks to our goalkeeper, we were only behind by a goal.” noted Kudelka when he praised goalkeeper Stanislav Škorvánek.
He failed 33 shots of the guests in the match. Michalovci scored two goals at the beginning of the third period, which were taken care of by defenders Christián Michalčin and Ivan Glazkov. “A few players started the whole team. We had a very good end of the second period. The guys came alive, started to believe in themselves. At the beginning of the second period, we scored two goals and got into the game. Our players blocked a lot of shots.” remarked Kudelka. Filip Vašaš sealed the 3:1 victory into an empty net.
The impregnable ice of Michaloviec
Slavists got into a difficult position. They lost against Michalovce three times in a row, they did not win on their ice in the current season. They need to win on home ice and do everything to extend the series to a decisive seventh game. Otherwise, the season for the defending champions will end at the beginning of the playoffs.
“We are in a difficult situation. We have to sleep on it and manage the next three games,” coach Ján Pardavý admitted. His wards took 2nd place in the regular season, narrowly trailing Košice. They met their opponent for the playoffs after the qualification, in which Michalovce eliminated Dukla Trenčín.
Goal efficiency is proving to be a big problem for the Slovanists. In four matches, they sent 170 shots at goalkeeper Škorvánek, of which they scored only 9 goals. Goalkeeper Michaloviec was the best in the quarter-final series with a 94.71 percent save success rate after four games.
Pardavý: We started doing stupid things
In the fourth match, they paid for different performances at the beginning and end of the match. “Today, there were two faces of Slovan. In the first half, we played actively, created chances and scored a goal. We needed the second one to calm down. But from about the 10th minute of the second period, we started doing stupid things.
Before the third period, we told ourselves that we had to go back to the game we played in the first period. Unfortunately, we conceded two goals at the beginning of it and from then on we were a completely different team. We were losing faceoffs, breaking up passes and not getting pucks through blockers.” said Pardavý.
