Athletistic / Hockey. Vancouver Canucks Russian forward Vasily Podkolzin has explained what his Swedish teammates think about the withdrawal of the Russian team from all international competitions. These sanctions were introduced by the International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF).
“Of course, my foreign partners have a bad attitude towards Russia’s exclusion from international tournaments. The Swedes tell me that the World Cup without Russia is not the same. According to them, without the Russian team, the level has dropped. I want more people to participate in the tournament, a strong team.
Nowadays, no one really watches the World Cup – interest in this tournament is noticeably decreasing. However, everyone is waiting for the Russia-Canada, Russia-USA matches. While there is no such thing and there is no opportunity to even watch such a match… We need to ask questions to the IIHF or I don’t know who,” Podkolzin quotes Izvestia.
After the 2024 World Cup, the Russian national team moved from third to second place in the IIHF ranking. This happened due to the defeat of the Finnish team in the quarterfinals of the World Championship. Although Russia has not participated in tournaments under the auspices of the IIHF since March 2022, its ranking has been frozen, which allows the “Red Machine” to remain as high as possible in the world ranking. Today, Russia, with 4,065 points, occupies second place in the ranking, followed by Finland (3,955).
Source: Sport
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.
