Ice Hockey World Championship in Prague
Great Britain against Austria, LIVE from 12.20 pm
Too bad, too bad! Austria's ice hockey team's dream of promotion was shattered on Tuesday at the A World Championships in Prague against relegated Great Britain of all teams. After the bitter, but unfortunately deserved 2:4 defeat, Roger Bader's team no longer has a chance of fourth place and the quarter-finals and has to return home. The ÖEHV team never found their rhythm against their supposedly weakest opponent.
The "Krone" reports from Prague
Austria opened the duel against Great Britain with the first shot on goal after 42 seconds by Zwerger - goalie Bowns made a save. The favorites were in control in the first period, but had to be patient: Because, as in recent games, the Brits relied on defense and tried to keep things tight at the back. Austria, who were sometimes too awkward in the offensive zone and also lost a couple of shots unnecessarily, did not have a great chance at first: Rossi (4th) failed to score, as did Nissner (9th) and Baumgartner (14th).
The Brits, who had already been relegated and had only scored eight goals in their first six games, struggled forward accordingly: Austria goalie Kickert looked secure on the few dangerous forays forward and was not beaten by either Perlini or Lake.
The ÖEHV team only had brief periods of pressure in the first 20 minutes through their star forwards Zwerger, Rossi & Schneider, and the favorites also let their first power play (17th) go to waste. As Wolf also failed with both of his shots, Austria went into the first period break goalless after 10:5 shots.
Goal for Austria
The second period began with a power play for Austria: Nissner failed to score from close range against Bowns, but after 2:40 minutes the time had finally come: Unterweger shot from the blue line after a pass from Zwerger and fixed the lead (23rd) - his second goal of the World Championship!
The opponents had a chance to equalize on the counter-attack, but Kickert reacted attentively. In the 27th minute, Austria suddenly picked up two bench penalties: Stapelfeldt had to go off for tripping, Zwerger served a team penalty for having too many players on the ice. In the 3-on-5 power play, Kickert initially outgrew himself after getting lucky with a shot off the stick and made a spectacular save with his catching hand when Davies was lying down. But shortly afterwards it hit Kickert's goal, O'Connor scored with a 140 km/h shot to equalize (28').
Great Britain take command
The goal gave the Brits, who had made up a lot of ground in the shooting statistics, a boost and unsettled the Austrians, who were struggling with major coordination problems: Kickert had to prevent the 1-2 against Dowd, who appeared alone in front of him (30'), and later also against Mosey and Betteridge (34') as well as Richardson (38') and Davies (39'). Bader's team had lost control of the game and struggled to set the tone offensively - the best chance was missed by Rossi, who failed to beat Bowns (40') after a feed from Schneider. Red-White-Red were well served with the 1:1 after 40 minutes, the shot ratio in the second period - 16:7 for Great Britain - spoke volumes.
The third period also got off to the worst possible start - with a two-minute penalty for captain Raffl after just eleven seconds for a cross-check. The British pressed for a 1:2 lead in the powerplay, which Perlini finally made perfect from close range (43') - the quarter-final dream receded further and further into the distance.
Austria in despair
Austria now acted with the courage of desperation, Baumgartner tested Bowns (44'). On the counter-attack, the underdogs were closer to making it 3:1, but Kickert was lucky when Betteridge hit the crossbar (46'). His front men were never able to put pressure on their opponents in the final period, even in a powerplay, and conceded the 1:3 through Mosey (51').
In the final period, team boss Bader risked everything early on, taking Kickert off the ice with just under five minutes to go - Dowd scored from his own third with 4:29 minutes remaining to make it 1:4 in the empty net - the final decision, Mario Huber's 2:4 with 44 seconds to go did nothing to change the World Cup exit. All in all, a great World Championship ends bitterly for Austria!
Austria - Great Britain 2:4 (0:0,1:1,1:3)
Prague, 16,306
Goals: Unterweger (23rd/PP), M. Huber (60th/PP) and O'Connor (28th/PP2), Perlini (42nd/PP), Mosey (51st), Dowd (56th/EN). Penalty minutes: 8 and 10 respectively.
Austria: Kickert; Nickl, Heinrich; Wolf, Untereweger; Maier; Strong; Stapelfeldt, Brunner; T.Raffl, Nissner, M. Huber; Schneider, Zwerger, Rossi; Ganahl, Haudum, Baumgartner; Wukovits, Rohrer, P. Huber.
Great Britain: Bowns - Halbert, Jones; O'Connor, Phillips; Batch, Richardson; Tetlow - Neilson, Perlini, Dowd; Mosey, Lake, Betteridge; Norris, Lachowicz, Curran; Shudra, Davies, Duggan
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