Sweden beats Italy by four

Sweden played a bad first period without speed but still managed to take a 2-0 lead against a much weaker Italian side. Marcus Krüger easy goal on an rebound for 1-0 and Staffan Kronwall made a nice deflection on a shot from Krüger for 2-0.
 
In the second period Sweden played much better but only managed to beat Daniel Bellissimo once when Erik Karlsson one timed a pass from Henrik Zetterberg to make it 3-0 on a 5 on 3 power play. Bellissimo made 16 saves in the period to keep Sweden's lead at three goals. A more focused Swedish team had probably done at least twice many goals at this point.

Gabriel Landeskog made his first ever goal for Team Sweden when he made it 4-0 early in the third. "It was important for my self confidence, to contribute. I got a good pass from Loui. I was almost free, just tried to turned in on goal. It was nice to see it go in", Landeskog said about his goal after being a bit uneven so far in the tournament.


Loui Eriksson - Sweden's leading scorer in this WC
Photo: Roman Kucera

Sweden went for more but Daniel Bellissimo continued to play a brave game to keep the numbers down. During the last period he seemed very tired and with seven minutes left to play he was replaced by Thomas Tragust. Tragust didn't concede any goals for the seven minutes he played. Despite of being a weaker team you have to admire the Italians for fighting the entire game to keep the numbers down.

One of many tired players after game was Nick Plastino who has played in the Swedish second league this season "It was a tough game, they play a high tempo game, we just try to play it tight all game. Bellissimo played unbelievable", he said and added"Me and de Marchi we had a lot of ice time as we're missing Helfer and Borgatello due to injury. Sweden is unbelievable team with a lot of NHL talent. It's hard to play Sweden in Stockholm. We came up short today but it's always a great experience".

"They worked hard and made it tough for us, they created a few chances but our goalie was good", Sweden's first goal scorer Marcus Krüger said about the opposition.

Patric Hörnqvist played his first game for Sweden after joining the team from NHL, about his first game he said "It's nice to be hom. Fun to be here and play. It was a strange game but we won it. It felt good for me, it was a good opposition to play against in the first game"


Hörnqvist in front ot the Italian net.
Photo: Roman Kucera

 

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