After a very narrow defeat against Finland, the fighting German national ice hockey team is once again playing for the bronze medal at the 2021 IIHF World Championship. National coach Toni Söderholm's team was close to reaching the final in an intense and completely open duel against the reigning world champions, but ultimately came up short with a score of 1:2 (0:2, 1:0, 0:0). In the Arena Riga, Matthias Plachta scored the goal for the German team in the majority.
The selection of the Deutscher Eishockey-Bund will face the USA in a duel for third place on Sunday (14.15 p.m./live on SPORT1) and still has one of the greatest successes in German ice hockey in mind.
Im DEBGoal started as usual by Mathias Niederberger and made his seventh start. Toni Söderholm also retained the combination of 13 strikers and seven defenders with which the DEB-Team played against Latvia (2:1) and Switzerland (3:2 n.P.). There was a change in personnel: Frederik Tiffels came into the team to replace Lean Bergmann.
The DEB-Selection had the chances, the Finns scored the goals - this is how the first third can be summarized as an example of the entire game. Söderholm's team kept getting into a promising position, Markus Eisenschmid (3rd), Tobias Rieder (4th), Eisenschmid again (10th) and Moritz Seider (17th) came very close to taking the lead. The Finns, on the other hand, were mercilessly effective, scoring twice in the few attacks of their own by Iiro Pakarinen (14th) and Hannes Bjorninen (19th).
In the second section, the DEB-Select back into the game. As has happened so often in the current World Cup tournament, it was a situation of being outnumbered that turned the momentum of the game: Tom Kühnhackl (29th) and Nico Krämmer (30th) bravely threw themselves into shots from the Finns and returned with faces contorted in pain back to the German bank. After the difficult phase was over, that played DEBteam exploited their own numerical superiority situation in an exemplary manner and came within one goal thanks to Matthias Plachtas' direct shot (32').
Even after that, the German team showed the familiar face, offered the reigning world champions a great fight and a completely open game until the final seconds. She had it several times DEB-Selection of the equalizer on the racket, which would have been deserved due to the shot record (28 Germany / 17 Finland) and the unconditional commitment.
But either the Finnish goalie Jussi Olkinuora somehow got to the target or the puck just missed the goal. As the best DEBplayer Matthias Plachta was honored.
Voices about the game:
DEB-Sports director Christian Künast: “Unfortunately, sport is not always fair. A great performance was not rewarded. Now it’s time to give everything we’ve got in the game for bronze tomorrow.”
National coach Toni Söderholm: “With this character, this performance and passion of the boys today, who proudly wear their national jersey, you will definitely win most games. I can't ask for more from the boys. I take my hat off to them, they can be proud of themselves because that was really strong. Things continue tomorrow, the boys in the dressing room know that. With this attitude I don't need to motivate the team extra. We know what we are playing for, we have set ourselves a medal as a reward and goal. And now there's only one other team standing in the way. We definitely want to take advantage of the opportunity.”
Captain Moritz Müller: “The disappointment is initially very big, we gave ourselves another chance to beat a top nation. We were the better team over the whole game, but at this level it's the little things that decide one way or the other. We wanted to become world champions, so everyone was hesitant at first. As soon as we get on the bus we look forward again and want to win the medal tomorrow.”
Striker Leo Pföderl: “We played a good game and had enough chances to score the goals. The Finns clearly had respect for us and therefore played very disciplined in defense and in the neutral zone. It's not over yet, there's still something to be won. We're actually playing an outstanding tournament across the board and the moment is perhaps very bitter. And tomorrow we want to get the thing.”