this week SKA surprised by the transfer noise. No, Evgeny Kuznetsov has not yet officially returned to the KHL, but, as has already reported, he is very close to it. So far, the St. Petersburg club has announced a new addition to its coaching staff. Help Romain Rotenberg and other SKA specialists will be… world and European judo champion Arman. We started the conversation with this topic.
“To win the Gagarin Cup, we need judo”
— From now on, the world judo champion Arman Adamyan will be part of the SKA coaching staff. Can I have some details?
– Here we have to take into account the history. My father was a judo coach, and I myself am passionate about this sport. Our new coach also trained at the club “Turbostroitel” in St. Petersburg. In general, we have known each other for several months.
And such a decision was planned at SKA for a long time. We used judo exercises in hockey. At one time, Yuri Zhdanov worked as our fitness trainer. He is also a former judoka. That is, we have already introduced judo skills into the training of hockey players. And now we want to reach a new level.
Arman will help us with general physical training. He will organically join our coaching team, which we are constantly strengthening – this is how Maxim Sokolov returned to us. We will make the most of Adamyan’s winning experience.
— How will judo help hockey?
— This sport provides the skills needed to win the Gagarin Cup. For example, it is a fight for the puck in the corners, joints and duels all over the field. Within the rules, of course. Hockey players must be not only technically competent, but also physically and mentally strong.
We have been looking for a judo coach for the SKA headquarters for a long time. And then a close friend, Olympic champion Tagir Khaibulaev, helped me. We found a very worthy candidate. Arman will work with us from the first day of the pre-season in Novogorsk.
— Adamyan is not ending his sports career? He won the world championship last year.
“We haven’t discussed it, it’s better to ask Arman yourself about his plans.” But I know he will help SKA a lot.
The Turbostroitel club was founded by Anatoly Rakhlin, who trained my father. They had a very close relationship. And in “Hockey City” we have a judo school “Turbo SKA”. Our little hockey players train there. In our opinion, these are two very interconnected sports.
Hockey is a martial arts game. Judo is about fights that have to be won. We talked about this symbiosis with Vladimir Yurzinov, and he said that he introduced such things in his hockey teams in the Soviet era. So this is an old, proven technique.
“I discussed with Montreal how to develop Demidov”
— Matvey Michkov arrived in Philadelphia, where his presentation will take place on July 24. Immediately in Montreal, they reacted by saying that Ivan Demidov will come to join them this season. But he has a contract with SKA until 2025.
— I spoke on Zoom for an hour and a half with representatives of the Montreal Canadiens. Head coach Martin Saint-Louis was not in contact, but special advisor to hockey operations Vincent Lecavalier, the club president, the general manager and all the executives were.
We discussed Demidov, everything was well discussed. It was a very positive conversation about how we will develop Ivan at SKA. There was not even a conversation about the fact that he is now leaving for Canada. It was the malicious critics who spread false news. Perhaps Russian journalists are even exaggerating this idea.
But the truth is that Montreal and I have a common plan for Demidov’s development. Our task is for Ivan to have his best season in the KHL. And here a lot depends not only on the coach, but also on the player himself. Nikita Zaitsev, Mikhail Grigorenko, Sergei Plotnikov joined us at SKA…
– Evgeny Kuznetsov will come…
“We have a very strong and competent team. And this will benefit Demidov. Adult teammates will help Vanya on the ice and in life. He will gain invaluable experience that will help him in the future.
“Kuznetsov may be better than McDavid”
– Well, will Kuznetsov really come to you? What’s the news?
— You are waiting for Evgeny to officially sign a contract in the KHL. There is no point in discussing it before that.
I know Zhenya very well. We have always been on very good terms. In 2017, he expressed his desire to play for SKA. That is why we bought the sports rights from Traktor. And we were always in touch, even when he was playing in America. We constantly communicated with him in different situations and were ready to help him.
Kuznetsov always flew to the Russian national team at the first call. We have a very warm friendly and working relationship with him. God willing, we will succeed. It would be very good for the KHL, and for our hockey in general, if such players returned to their homeland. Kuznetsov embodies the Soviet style of hockey. He skates very well, he has a good thinking about the game. He can become the best player in the world if he wants.
– Better than Connor McDavid?
– Definitely. He has a crazy motivation: to prove it to everyone, as he already did in the playoffs in 2018 with Washington. Then Zhenya became the top scorer of the competition and won the Stanley Cup.
— SKA must make trades to meet salary cap…
– We always have a plan. Of course, we will have to make some exchanges. But this is our job. We will do it if necessary. The main thing is to assemble the strongest possible team so that SKA wins the Gagarin Cup. We will do our best for this. If we have to make exchanges, we will. Because competition is the engine of progress. Would you give up a player like Kuznetsov?
– Never.
– So you and I are on the same wavelength.
— With what feelings will you return to the Ice Palace? After all, the SKA Arena will not be used in the new season.
— And we never left Ledovoye. We won the Kharlamov Cup there last spring. We had no intention of leaving there. We have a base there across the street – “Hockey City”. We lived in the Ice Palace for many years and did everything wisely. Both the lighting and the quality of the ice – everything is perfect there.
— After the “Match of the Year”, what did you talk about in the locker room with Oleg Znarok and the star players? We haven’t seen each other for a long time and now we have a meeting.
— We recalled different moments of how we worked together in the Russian national team. We remembered the golden Pyeongchang. And we discussed that maybe we should make a film about the 2018 Olympics. We are seriously thinking about it.
– Wow!
– Yes. We have already talked about it with the famous actor and director Vladimir Mashkov. Because when we went to Korea, we watched the film “Moving Up” about the great victory of our basketball players in 1972. There, the role of coach was played by Vladimir Lvovich. We received a lot of motivation.
And we are actively discussing the idea of a film about hockey. We have Indian partners ready to participate in this project. They have been cooperating with Mashkov for a long time and organize film festivals in India. You can combine all this, but it takes time, you have to write a script.
— Who would Mashkov himself play in this film?
— I think he could play the role of Oleg Znarok.
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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.
