Slovak ice hockey players, despite a promising tournament, did not reach the quarterfinals, and the 89th WC ended for them already after the basic group. The coach Vladimír Országh already spoke before the tournament about the fact that after the apologies of more than two dozen players, space was opened for others. Quantity former hockey player Vincent Lukáč (72) does not like the absences received by the national team. He told me straight up what he thought about it.
“Don’t even tell me this. Couldn’t a 20-year-old play 10 more games after the season? Is he tired and needs healing? I’ve never heard that in my entire career. For me, these are unthinkable things. Everyone must examine his own conscience. If he has really good reasons for it, fine. But for a young lad to refuse to represent me because I’m tired or I have to treat a minor injury? That’s nonsense. The whole of Slovakia is waiting for him and he says that he is tired. Honor the exceptions, but those are ridiculous excuses,” he said.
Lukáča also regrets that the World Championships are no longer of such a level as it once was and would like the IIHF to think about who they should play after the Olympics. According to him, people are then oversaturated with hockey and it greatly reduces the quality. “This is not the World Cup for me. This is a tournament of second and third-rate teams from most countries. It offends me when this is supposed to be a World Cup.” he added.
In the end, the former representative also evaluated the overall impression of our selection at this year’s championship. “We didn’t have big eyes. Coach Országh went there with what he had available. You have to put your hand on your heart, like a hat off to a fan, but an expert looks at it a little differently. We knew we weren’t going to stir much water, although initially everything was going according to the scenario we wanted. But teams like the Czech Republic, Canada and Sweden came. We didn’t manage it, although we weren’t worse with the Czechs and not even with the Swedes,” he revealed.
Lukáč claims that the Slovaks did not embarrass themselves at the WC, but the final result is clear – we failed to advance to the quarterfinals. “We can’t be alibis. In short, we weren’t effective. Even with strong opponents, we didn’t know how to take chances. We were better, but we didn’t score goals. Whether they were Czechs or Swedes. If it was 4:1 for us after the first period with Sweden, no one can say anything,” he concluded.
