EThere are two types of away games for Löwen Frankfurt players in the German Ice Hockey League (DEL). For a small proportion of the games that take place away from home, they only travel there by bus on the day of the game. For the most part, they leave a day earlier. If the team around coach Gerry Fleming only arrives on the day of the game, the lions usually come into the game weaker. This was shown most recently in the away games in Iserlohn (3:5) and in Mannheim (2:3 after a penalty shoot-out), when the team arrived on the day of the game.
Only in the course of the game did the lions gradually increase their playful performance. “The fact that we can drive to many games a day earlier is already an upgrade compared to last season. We went to Weißwasser on the same day, played and then went home again,” says sporting director Franz-David Fritzmeier.
The game in Ingolstadt on Sunday was completely different. The lions arrived a day earlier and presented themselves wide awake from the start. In the 6-1 away win, Dylan Wruck (5th minute), Simon Sezemsky, Dominik Bokk, Kevin Maginot (13th each) and David Elsner (17th/53rd) scored five goals for the lions in the first third.
Plans are already being made to decide who will still be on the bus when the lions travel away from home next year. In the background, the sports director is talking to various players and their advisors. “I haven’t told any player in the team that he won’t be playing here next season,” says Fritzmeier. He doesn’t even have a reason to. Many players advertise themselves with positive performances on the ice, and the team chemistry is right.
Who stays will also depend on how intensively higher-budget clubs get into betting. The 22-year-old striker Dominik Bokk is currently in the spotlight. On Friday evening he scored both goals for the lions in the 2:3 defeat against EHC Munich and once again showed his class as a player.
But not only the professionals on the ice, also the interest of the spectators hardly diminishes. 5607 spectators follow the games on average in the ice rink. Overall, more spectators came to the games at only four DEL locations.
