Victory and defeat for the Young Talent national teams in the evening. The U18 team defeated Belarus 2-1 (0-0, 1-0, 1-1) in Copenhagen, Denmark. In Cergy, France, however, after a 17-4 lead, the U0 national team had to admit defeat to the hosts 4:5 (3:0, 1:3, 0:1, 0:1) after extra time.
The game of U18 national team against Belarus remained goalless for a long time. The DEB-Selection created a slight increase in chances, but were unable to beat Yan Shostak in the Belarusian goal. It took until the 32nd minute before Julius Ramoser scored the opening goal with a shot under the crossbar - after preparatory work by Joshua Geuss and Markus Schweiger. As a result, the took over DEB-Selection took control of the game and pushed for the second goal. But U18 national coach Steffen Ziesche's team had to wait until four minutes before the end before Florian Elias made it 2-0. With the final siren, German Yavash scored the goal - but the goal also represented the last situation of the game.
The U17 national team took the lead against France after just five minutes. Julian Lutz made it 1-0 after preparatory work from Markus Freis and Connor Korte. In the opening third, Nikolaus Heigl (12th minute) and Sebastian Cimmerman (17th minute) increased their lead to a three-goal lead. After the third break, Sebastian Cimmerman scored the 4-0 for the German team and thus scored a brace. However, a French comeback followed: Maxime Orlov (28th), Mathis Chattelard (36th) and Sasha Djigaouri (37th) scored for the hosts and made the score 3-4 at halftime. In the final section, Théo Gueurif (47th) even scored the equalizer. The game would ultimately find the winner in overtime. France took advantage of the momentum there and secured a 5-4 win in the 63rd minute thanks to Konstantin Kebets.
Steffen Ziesche, U18 national coach: “We are of course happy about the opening win. It was a unified team performance today - the players also played very well tactically and didn't allow much in defense. We dominated the game for long stretches and ultimately deserved to win. We can build on our performance.”
Thomas Schädler, Young Talent national coach: “The team got off to a very good start in the game and were very focused until they made it 4-0. Then it was too much risk, we neglected the defense and brought the French back into the game. They then got a second wind and used their euphoria to ultimately win the game. We have to learn from today’s mistakes and show an appropriate response on the ice.”
You can find all the statistics for the game between the U18 national team and Belarus HERE.
You can find all the statistics for the game between the U17 national team and France HERE.