The 1999/2000 EHL participants - Presentation Division A

EC Heraklith Villach /  Metallurg Magnitogorsk /  HC Slovnaft Vsetin /  HC Slovan Bratislava

For almost two decades, Giuseppe Mion has been one of the most proficient and skilled defenceman in Austrian ice hockey, being also credited with the captain's title of the National team all over the world. Today, Mion, 40, is the general manager of EC Heraklith Villach, and he feels ready, together with coach Ron Kennedy and some of the most experienced players of Austrian hockey, to jump onto the bandwagon of the Skoda Auto European Hockey League. <We know what is awaiting us and it is a tough job - explains Mion, - but we want to, and will, demonstrate that Austrian clubs can play good hockey and that VEU Feldkirch's win two years ago did not represent just a mere coincidence. We have, however, lots of respect for Magnitogorsk, Vsetin and Bratislava>.
It won't be, in any case, with respect that Villach will win the six games of the Division A: <We are well known all over Austria as a team with an immense heart and proud. We will fight like tigers and try to win as many games as possible. We owe this to our fans and to all Austrian fans. Being the National champions, we have the honour of representing our country at the best possible level>.
Two of the four National championships won by Villach arrived with Ron Kennedy sitting on the coaching bench. Kennedy, 46, a former member of the coaching staff of the New York Islanders and of the Eisbären Berlin, at present coach also of the Austrian National team, is aware of the difficulties of playing in a Division with the EHL champions and two of the strongest clubs of Czech Republic and Slovakia: <Looking at the teams in our group one might say that we are cut out from the top positions, but I believe Villach might turn into the surprise packet of the Division. We have a lots of confidence in our fighting spirit and the ones who know us, know that we never give up and that we play every game with a winning spirit. Metallurg, Slovan and Vsetin belong to the élite of European ice hockey, some of the best players of our Continent skate with their jerseys and I feel it is a big honour for Villach to play these clubs>. Aiming at surprising European ice hockey just like Feldkirch managed to do in the 1997/98 EHL season, Mion and Kennedy have been working hard to present a competitive roster. <Our team looks much different from the one who won last season's championship - explains Mion. - We have reduced the number of foreign players to only five and we said goodbye to our stars Marty Murray and Jean-Ives Roy, who reinforced the Kölner Haie in the German DEL. But we have talented and skilled players like Brad Schlegel, Team Canada's captain at the World Championship in Norway, Gino Cavallini and Gordon Donnelly, and goalie Mikael Sandberg. And next to them we have opened the doors of the senior team some of our best young players>. According to Kennedy, it will be absolutely necessary <to find, in the shortest possible time, the right chemistry between veterans and rookies. In Austria we are feared because we never give up, because we keep on skating, fighting and playing until the final buzzer. This is our spirit, a winning one. And we will bring it along with us to the EHL. Of our opponents, I only consider Magnitogorsk as real superior, while I think we can have some chances against Slovan and Vsetin. I am terribly excited, I can’t wait to start this new adventure.

It’s not an easy life to be the reigning champions, and Valeri Beloussov knows it very well: "I have seen it during all the games we played in the pre-season - explains Metallurg Magnitogorsk head coach. - When we go on the ice, our opponents have something in their eyes which tells you they will make extra efforts to beat you. We are the EHL champions, beating us means a lot to everybody out there". Unfortunately for Mr. Beloussov, things are not supposed to change in less than two weeks time, when the fourth season of the Skoda Auto European Hockey League will get into motion. "The difficult part begins now - he admits. - If winning the 1998/99 EHL was difficult, what is expected of us now is even harder. We have been playing 18 pre-season games so far and all our opponents have been playing with the same aggressiveness and intensity like Ambrì Piotta did during the Super Cup game. We have to be ready to see this happen during all the EHL games we will play. But we are the EHL champions and we feel ready". Despite having lost 2-0 to Ambrì in the IIHF Super Cup, the Russians are still aiming high: "We always had one and only one plan, and this plan is to win - explains Viktor Rashnikov, President of Metallurg. - But this season will be more difficult than the previous one for at least two reasons: due to the reduction of the participating clubs there will be no more weak contenders; second, it is always harder to reconfirm as the best team, rather than to reach the top. But this, in any case, just makes everything more intriguing and challenging".
Faithful to the rule that a winning team is never changed, the GM Gennadj Velitchkin reconfirmed almost the entire squad. 25 of the 27 players that will defend the EHL title in the 1999/2000 season are part of the team that dominated during last season the Russian championship and triumphed in Europe. The only new faces are the one of Maxim Bets, 25 years old left winger, 2 goals and 3 points in 3 games in the EHL inaugural season with CSKA Moscow and of right winger Andrey Petrakov, 23, acquired from Automobilist. "We have a very experienced team and we have lots of confidence in our chances of repeating what we did only a few months ago" says Velitchkin, who has already forgotten the delusion of the loss in the Super Cup game. "Of course we would have liked to complete the Grande Slam, but this is why sport is so fascinating. One day you win, the next one you can lose, in the Super Cup we learned an important lesson".
One year ago, Metallurg represented mainly an incognito in the EHL field. Now, all the eyes are focused on the Russian club. "There is for sure more pressure on us than just one year ago - admits Beloussov, - but I think that this is something my players are used to. In some way, starting as the reigning champions is giving us some more incentive. We have been working during the summer with two goals ahead of us: to win the EHL and the Russian championship. I think we have a team that can guarantee us to compete for both these goals".
With the qualification to the Semifinal Round which should not represent a major problem, Rashnikov is already focused on the potential opponents on the road to the Silver Stone: "There are no weak teams on the field, but if I should say whom I respect the most, I would say Dynamo Moscow and HIFK Helsinki". At the beginning of February we will know if he was right.

Five consecutive National championships cannot be won without having an impact on a team. The richest clubs in the world knock at the door and, sooner or later, the best players leave for new destinations. This is what has happened to HC Slovnaft Vsetin during the summer, as stars like Pavel Patera (Dallas Stars, NHL), Martin Prochazka (Atlanta Trashers, NHL), Michal Bros and Ondrej Kratena (both HC Sparta Praha) have left the club who dominated the last five years of the Czech ice hockey. "Their departure will have for sure an impact on the team, you cannot think to replace from one minute to the other players like Patera or Prochazka - says Zdislav Tabara, Vsetin’s head coach, - but we were prepared to these changes and even if we lost a lot in experience and skills, we have lots of confidence in the potential of our team".
Vsetin returns to the EHL after one year of absence and after finishing 3^rd in the 1997/98 EHL season with a 3-1 win over Russian Torpedo Yaroslavl in the bronze medal game, but the team that will face the EHL champions of Metallurg Magnitogorsk, Slovan Bratislava and EC Heraklith Villach in the Division A of the Skoda Auto European Hockey League looks much different than the one that managed to win all the National titles after the promotion to the top Czech league. "We tried to compensate the many departures with the arrival of Jan Pardavy (28 years old, right wing, 3 goals and 5 points in 3 EHL games with Dukla Trencin in the 1997/98 EHL season), one of the best Slovakian players of the last few years, one player who has the ability to come in and make an impact on our club. But we have also inserted in the first team some very promising young players. What we will lose in experience we will gain in enthusiasm and commitment. And playing in a high profile tournament like the EHL is, will allow our players to make international experience as well" explains Tabara.
With Metallurg seeming to have something more than their opponents, Vsetin will have to fight with Slovan and Villach to grab the second place in the group and be promoted to the Semi-final Round. "Our task will not be an easy one - says EHL Manager Oldrich Stefl. - I think we were seeded in one of the toughest Divisions, even if, with only 16 teams participating, there will be no easy Divisions this season. Metallurg are the reigning champions, Bratislava was always one of the top EHL clubs and after what VEU Feldkirch was able to do two seasons ago, I don’t believe that Villach will just be happy to appear as an extra. We will have to play every game, home or away, with the same intensity and try to collect as many points as possible on the road".
Vojtech Marak, GM of Vsetin, is fully confident in the hunger for success of the players: "We are the reigning Olympic and World champions, and we want to show that we belong to the top positions also in the club competitions. There is a lot of enthusiasm and hockey fever in Vsetin for our return to the EHL, we just don’t want to disappoint all our fans".

Entering for the fourth consecutive time the Skoda Auto European Hockey League, one of the only four clubs who can claim a participation in all the editions of the tournament, HC Slovan Bratislava is aiming at reaching for the first time the medal round. Twice the Slovakian club made its way up to the playoffs stage, finishing eliminated by Dynamo Moscow in the EHL inaugural season and by HC Petra Vsetin in the following one. Last year things did not run as smoothly for Slovan, who finished third in the Division Round B behind IFK Helsinki and Färjestads BK. "We lost important points with 3 overtime and game winning shots losses - says Slovan’s manager, Lubomir Lenar. - Had we won only one of those games, we would have made our way to the postseason. Hopefully things will run better for us this season". Slovan enters the new season with the highest ambitions, as Vladimir Pastinsky, the club’s Director, confirms: "We operated quite a few changes on our team in order to make it more competitive and we feel we did all we could to present a competitive roster. Our Division presents some hard opponents and I have lots of respect especially for Metallurg Magnitogorsk and Vsetin. But I am also sure that Villach might represent the surprise of the group. In any case, we have been working hard during the past months to build a team able to reach one of the two playoff spots. This is our minimal goal, everything has been prepared to obtain this goal". With the participation to the Semi-final Round as minimal target, Slovan operated a radical lifting, adding 9 new players to the team roster. Completely new the goaltending, where Martin Kucera (Danubia Bratislava) and Radovan Biegl (HC Trinec, Czech Republic) take the place of Ivo Capek, returned after 3 seasons to Czech Republic and Ratislav Rovnianek, important changes have been made in the defense, where the departures of Martin Strbak and Robert Pukavolic have been replaced by the arrival from Kosice of solid Daniel Babka, and of Marek Priechodski, while in the offence centers Miroslav Hlinka (from Sparta Praha, 5 goals, 12 points and 32 penalty minutes in 16 EHL Division Round games, 1 goal and 3 points in 6 playoffs games) and Juraj Stefanka (from HC Nitra), and wingers Roman Tomasech and Martin Krumpal should guarantee some more power and speed to the team. To guarantee some additional depth to the line up, space should be given to some junior players like left defenseman René Vydareny, and right wing Erik Weissmann. "We are very aware that the coming EHL will be a very tough one - says Ernest Bokros, since 1996 head coach of Slovan. - We are facing some clubs who make no mystery of their high ambitions. We are also ambitious, we have 3 years experience in this League and we know what we have to do to achieve good results. Most important of all, we will have to play a good system, we have the players to do it, now it’s time to demonstrate we can turn all the projects into facts. We worked hard during the past months to find a good chemistry on the ice, we feel ready to do what all Slovakia is asking us to do".