Switzerland Claims Victory but Struggles in the Middle Third against Norway

After Leonardo Genoni at the start, the second goalie Robert Mayer also celebrated a shutout. However, he was the only Swiss to be satisfied with what was shown. After a solid and superior start third, Patrick Fischer’s team gave up the game in the middle third.

Suddenly too hesitant

Instead of extending the actually reassuring lead by Dario Simion in the 9th minute and Andrea Glauser (20th), the modest Norwegians were really invited to play on an equal footing. The Swiss suddenly acted too hesitantly and passively and had to be happy at the end of the middle section that the two-goal lead held up. If Mayer only had to fend off one shot in the first third, it was fourteen by the end.

The powerplay also didn’t work as desired, the Norwegians even had the best chances to score when they were outnumbered. Once Mayer saved in dire need, right after the start of the final third the former La Chaux-de-Fonds and Biel legionnaire Mathias Trettenes failed on the post. So the Swiss could only be sure of victory after Nino Niederreiter’s 3:0 into the empty goal.

In the first third, everything pointed to another Schützenfest. In addition to the two wonderfully played goals, a goal by Janis Moser was disallowed after a coaches challenge due to a goalie obstruction by Andres Ambühl, and Christian Marti hit the post once. After that, however, good scoring chances were scarce. At least the outnumbered game worked well again, five penalties were overcome without any problems worth mentioning.

Against Kazakhstan on Tuesday

After a rest day on Tuesday, the Swiss will continue against the next outsider Kazakhstan – then maybe with the further NHL reinforcement Kevin Fiala.