Karjala Cup 2022 nominations: Who will start the EHT?

And although Sparta is in a huge crisis in the extra league, their club teammate David Němeček joins Jandus and Vitouch in the list for the tournament held in České Budějovice and Turku.

“It’s always positive and good to have new faces in the squad and give them the opportunity to prove themselves. I saw Jandus with Vitouch five times, they skate well, which is needed in international hockey. They don’t make mistakes and follow the system,” says Jalonen.

He knows that the Spartans’ defensive game is far from ideal, yet he stands behind the selection of Jandus and Němeček. “Of course I know Sparta’s results, I was at their match in Pilsen on Wednesday. I don’t look at results, but at individual performances. Jandus is constantly improving, we already had the German in the training camp before this year’s World Cup. They will play together in the same defense in the national team.

“Since the start of the extra league season, I have personally watched 13 extra league games and I have to say that I liked what I saw in them. They were played with great intensity, at a high level and with a lot of fighting. It was really an excellent match,” explains Jalonen’s preference for the home extra-league in his nomination.

Perhaps surprisingly, the most productive extraleague players Lukáš Radil from Pardubice and Dominik Lakatoš from Vítkovice are missing from the nomination. “Both of them are excellent players, but I don’t want to talk about individuals and say why I didn’t nominate them. Of course, I know that Lakatoš plays excellently, I talked about him with the Vítkovice coaches. But there are a lot of players I could take, and if it’s even a little bit possible, we’ll take an almost completely different team to the tournament in Switzerland in December,” reveals Jalonen.

The Finnish coach also included nine players from May’s World Cup in his selection. At that time, goalkeeper Langhamer, defenders Sklenička, Ščotka, Kundrátek and forwards Červenka, Černoch, H. Zohorna, M. Špaček, Smejkal fought for the bronze medal in Tampere, Finland. The first-named forward will be the team captain at Karjale.

The nomination includes three goalkeepers, ten defenders and fifteen forwards. In addition to the 17 players active in the extra league, five active in the Swedish top league and three from the Finnish and Swiss were called up.

He thus has five complete fives available for Karjala. Some will play all three matches, others only two. Goalkeeper Stezka will train with the team only before the opening match against Sweden in České Budějovice, he will no longer travel to Turku with the team, and the matches will be shared between goalkeepers Will and Langhamer.

Jalonen also sought striker Jan Kovář from the Swiss Zug. “He plays in it, but his health is not 100%. That’s why we agreed that I won’t take him now. As well as two other players who are not fully fit. But I don’t want to name names,” said Jalonen. One of them is Tomáš Zohorna, who only returned to the Pardubice lineup on Tuesday after an almost two-week break caused by injury.

For the December tournament in Switzerland, the head coach plans to take a significantly changed squad compared to the current one for Karjala. “At both tournaments we want to have a mix of players we know and haven’t seen before. Captain Červenka will be such a role model and mentor for the younger ones at Karjale. And in February we will go to Sweden again with a younger team of players under the age of twenty-five. To see how they will do on the international stage,” adds Jalonen, saying that he will leave the older players in their clubs, which will already start preparing for the playoffs.

The Karjala tournament, the opening event of the Euro Hockey Tour series, traditionally comes as the first test. The national team will start on Thursday, November 10 in České Budějovice against Sweden, and will finish the rest of the tournament in its main venue, Turku. There, he will first challenge the home Finns on Saturday and the Swiss a day later.

It is the selection of the Helvetic Cross that will replace Russia on the Euro Hockey Tour in the coming two seasons, which was excluded from the tournaments due to the outbreak of the war in Ukraine.