He played without sleep, he came despite a crazy season. It was too much, Zohorna begged

Riga (from our correspondent) – Twenty-seven-year-old Zohorna led the fourth formation with Radan Lenec and Daniel Voženílk during the 2:4 defeat. In almost eleven minutes on the ice, he shot once and had a 30 percent success rate.

“It wasn’t easy for him, but he showed that he will help us. He performed very well,” national team coach Kari Jalonen praised the last-minute reinforcement.

Zohorna himself was more critical: “I was like that… it was neither bad nor good. But we sat a lot with the guys from the line. It’s a shame that we didn’t convert our chances. Otherwise, the center position suited me, I like playing there, I just have to work on bulls.”

Zohorna, like Lenc, added to the national team additionally, because thanks to a new rule of the IIHF hockey federation, the Czech Republic could call up substitutes for the injured stars Filip Chytil and Lukáš Sedlák.

Both reinforcements jumped into the game shortly after their arrival.

But Zohorn had a harder time in that he did not travel from the Czech Republic, but from overseas. On Thursday night, he was eliminated by the Toronto farm in the division final of the AHL. Just two hours later, he received a phone call from the general manager of the national team, Martin Havlát, and confirmed to him that he could come to the WC.

On Friday, he had a priority medical check-up and the day after that he boarded a plane in Toronto. He arrived in Riga on Sunday around one o’clock in the afternoon.

“It was a very long flight. Unfortunately, I can’t sleep on the plane and I don’t want to take pills,” Zohorna described how he stayed awake the entire flight. He fell asleep at the hotel, but only for an hour, which can hardly be considered a full-fledged sleep.

Thinking it would help with his jet lag, he wanted to jump into the game right away, not until Tuesday against Canada. Although he never trained with the team and – unlike Lence – he did not even complete a training camp, he quickly absorbed the game system thanks to the video instruction. “A similar system is played everywhere, only the details are sometimes different. I only agreed with the boys that they would tell me if I wandered on the ice,” said Zohorna.

The transition from an overseas ice rink to a European one didn’t cause any problems for him either. “In terms of speed, it’s similar to America here, but thanks to the wider field, you have a little more time on the puck – that suited me. Otherwise, I didn’t see any difference,” he noted.

He had a tough season overseas. He started in Pittsburgh’s training camp, but by the time he was on the unprotected list, Calgary had reached out to him. There, he played only eight games for the main team, spending most of his time on the farm.

To make matters worse, before the transfer deadline, Zohorna was traded to Toronto, where he once again played in the NHL, but spent most of his time in the lower AHL.

“That’s a long time, we’d have to sit down for a coffee,” he replied when he had to summarize the miserable season. “There was an awful lot. I’ve been on so many teams and met about three hundred people, so I forget everyone’s name. I already… It was really challenging and definitely not what I imagined.”

“Maybe things will improve here by winning a medal,” added the almost two-meter forward.

His brother Tomáš, who has won four world championships, quickly flew in to support him against the Swiss. Radim is only at the beginning with his first start at the WC. “A dream come true,” he announced after the premiere.