Nohavica sings a sad song to Slovakia

An Ostrava`s locally well-known folk songwriter and performer Jaromír Nohavica gave a private concert to Team Slovakia two days ago. In his set list there was also a brand-new song "Pieseň smutného hokejistu" about depression of a Slovak player who feels to be out of form during the World Championship.

Like if Nohavica forecasted the future, lyrics of his song could be applied to this evening`s game of Slovakia against Finland perfectly. Even though the team from foothills of the High Tatras tried to be an equal opponent to Suomi, in the review we see that during whole game, Finland was better, more active and deserved to win.

The first period of the game has been so far the best one which you could watch during Ostrava`s part of the 2015 IIHF World Championship. Finland was in charge of playmaking and Slovakia tended to concentrate on defending and occassional breakaways.

One of those ended up with the puck in Finland`s net already, but the goal was recalled by referees due to highsticking of the shooter Libor Hudacek. On the other side of the rink Ján Laco stealed a couple of sure goals from Finnish sticks. Especially the situation of Laco covering the chance of Anssi Salmela who received an amazing crossing pass from Finnish captain Jussi Jokinen is worth including into the tournament`s highlights.

No goal was achieved during the first twenty minutes and the situation was similar also after the second horn. During the middle session, Finns were a little better again, while Slovaks attacking from quick transitions and breakaways.

After all, Slovakia could be upset of the twenty-five seconds long 5-on-3 powerplay during which they even did not settle down in the attacking zone, as well as of the wasted breakaway by Mario Bliznak who did not even shoot after all.

Suomi were very patient instead, constantly making the play, shooting a lot (31 v. 22 SOG) and waiting for the moment, which actually came ten minutes to go in the third period. Joonas Donski deflected a slapshot of Esa Lindell and sent it into the net. There was again a suspiction of highsticking, but this time video proved the goal was regular.

Finns hurted Slovakia even more seriously in time 55:33. Janne Pesonen won a personal battle behind Laco net and found totally uncovered Joonas Kemppainen in front who scored from a one-timer: 2-0.

And the score was closed by Leo Komarov seven seconds before the end while Slovakia was playing with the empty net and six men on the ice, but were unable to even buid up a constant pressure in the zone and the lost puck was stealed by Komarov and delivered into the net.

This is the fourth consecutive shutout for Team Finland, but while Pekka Rinne was not dressed for the game at all, this one goes to Juuse Saros who did just one visible mistake during the game - in the second period he left to the bench as he noticed a penalty call is coming. But actually, it showed up it was an advantage for Slovakia which could score an easy goal, but did not get to the puck after all. Apart of this amusing situation he presented with a very compact performance.

Consequences:

The situation of Slovakia is now very complicated. The only way to the quarterfinals seems to be the one through winning both remaining games against Russia and USA, while still having to pray for favorable combination of results of the teams currently residing in TOP 4.

With this victory over Slovakia, Finns make another threesome tie in the top of Group B, while joining USA and Russia with 12 points and being two points ahead of Belarus and three more in advance to Slovakia. From two remaining games against Belarus and Russia it is enough for them to reach the only point and they are in the quarterfinals for sure

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