Spartak forward Andrei Loktionov told that he quickly found mutual understanding with Ilya Kovalchuk who returned to big hockey.
On Sunday, 40-year-old forward Ilya Kovalchuk played his first game for Spartak in the KHL. His team defeated Kunlun Red Star (5:2) in Luzhniki, and Kovalchuk himself, who played in a trio with Andrei Loktionov and Maxim Tsyplakov, scored a goal into an empty net and spent 14 minutes 33 seconds on the ice.
— How did the match with Kunlun go?
— In principle, everything was going well for us until the start of the third period. Then we started to make mischief and quickly conceded a few goals.
— Was mutual understanding quickly found in the team with Ilya Kovalchuk?
– Yes, from the first training. We practiced on Saturday and played on Sunday. We had a few chances to score. But we could not achieve this with equal strength.
— You and Kovalchuk played online at the 2013 World Championships.
– It doesn’t matter at all. It’s already been 10 years. Everything has to be redone, from scratch.
— In the end, did you deliberately ensure that Ilya scored into an empty goal?
– He gave it to me, I gave it to him. Then he gave it back to me, I gave it back to him. That’s what happened, and he hit it well with a clumsy hand. Everything was great.
— How did you perceive Kovalchuk in the locker room?
— Yes, I just came in and said hello to everyone. A typical work moment when a new person joins the team. Young people called him “Ilya Valerievich”. I’m a little older, so “Ilyukha”, “Kovy”, “Old Man”.
But Ilya is a very authoritarian person in hockey, he gives a lot of advice. So it has improved a lot. Plus, he can score in a 5-on-4 power play. His good shot hasn’t disappeared. So we are waiting for more.
— Maybe Kovalchuk pushed the speech?
– No, that didn’t happen. “He was just encouraging,” Loktionov told .
Spartak occupies first place in the championship with 62 points in 44 matches.
Watch live broadcasts of the Fonbet KHL Championship matches on the channel, as well as on the matchtv.ru and sportbox.ru sites.
Source : MatchTV
I’m Emma Smith, a dedicated journalist and avid storyteller. I have been writing for news websites for the past 5 years, reporting on hockey news and delivering in-depth analysis of the sport. In my current role as Author at Athletistic, I write about hockey events from around the world to keep followers up-to-date with what’s happening in the sport.
