In the final Olympic qualification for women's Group D in Füssen, the German team will face Austria (11.11/17, 15:13.11 p.m., LIVE on MagentaSport), Italy (12/00, 14.11:12 p.m., LIVE on MagentaSport) and Denmark (00/XNUMX ., XNUMX:XNUMX p.m., LIVE on MagentaSport). The DEB-Women are the highest-placed of the four teams in the IIHF world rankings (rank 8). While Austria and Denmark have never taken part in the Olympic Games with their women's teams, the Italians qualified directly as hosts in Turin in 2006. The German team played in the Olympic ice hockey tournament in 2002, 2006 and 2014. The black-red-gold women achieved their best placement in 2006 with fifth place.
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Austria
The German team's first opponents are the Austrians. They are in 14th place in the current women's ice hockey world rankings. They were seeded for the final Olympic qualification tournament. Their last appearance at a major competition was the Division I Group A World Championship in Budapest in April 2019. There they very unfortunately only finished fourth. They were able to defeat both opposing teams in the Olympic qualifying tournament, Denmark (8:3) and Italy (4:1), but were narrowly defeated by the Hungarians and Norway.
With the Finnish coach Jari Risku, a very experienced women's ice hockey coach has recently joined the Austrian team. The 55-year-old trained as an assistant coach for his home country's national team and then took over the position of head coach for various Finnish women's teams and the U18 girls in his home country.
This year he completed two official test matches with his team before the direct preparation for the Olympic qualification. The experienced Charlotte Wittich from the Sabers Vienna was particularly impressive with a goal and two assists. The absolute leader in the Austrian dressing room, Esther Väärälä, also plays for the EWHL series winner from Vienna. The 36-year-old first appeared at a World Cup for her home country in 2004 and has only played once outside of Austria since then (2005/06: Quebec Avalanche, NWHL). In total, she took part in thirteen world championships and three Olympic qualifying tournaments. The Austrians have four players from the US college league NCAA in their squad: Meilan Haberl, Anja Trummer (both Yale University), Theresa Schafzahl and Antonia Matzka (both University of Vermont) and Janine Weber from the Connecticut Whale from the Premier Hockey Federation (PHF) a player from the current top North American women's league. 16-year-old Leonie Kutzer, who plays in Switzerland, could develop into the biggest talent.
In goal, Jessica Ekrt, daughter of ex-DEL player Martin Ekrt (Nuremberg, also in Füssen in the 2nd league in 1994/95, as a coach in Höchstadt and Sonthofen) was supposed to be the tournament's starting goalkeeper. The 23-year-old has impressed so far Mad Dogs Mannheim in the DFEL completely. The Electoral Palatinate women are currently in second place in the table.
Overall, it will be important for Coach Risku to weld the individually strong players from the many different clubs together as a team.
Italy
In their only Olympic appearance to date, for which, as mentioned, they qualified directly as hosts in Turin 2006, the Italians ended up in eighth place, had to accept some heavy defeats, but were (almost) narrowly defeated by the German team by 2: 5.
The Italian national team is currently in 16th place in the IIHF women's world rankings. In the second round of the Olympic qualification tournaments, the Italians won all three matches against Spain, Chinese Taipei and Kazakhstan in their home stadium in Torre Pellice at the beginning of October. The Azzuri ended up with three wins and a goal difference of 13:2. Their special team spirit, which manifested itself in euphoric hugs and loud singing along to the Italian anthem after the three victories, caused a stir. Videos of this caused a sensation on various social media channels.
This tournament was the first appearance of the Italian national team after the Corona break since the 2019 World Cup Division IA. After they had just been promoted to the second highest World Cup group, they had to go straight back to Division I B. They didn't manage a single win.
The team mainly consists of players from EV Bozen Eagles. The Eagles play in the European Women's Hockey League (EWHL). The top scorer at the tournament in Torre Pellice was Anna Caumo. The 19-year-old is also eligible to play for Bozen. She scored four goals in the three games and prepared two more goals. Chelsea Furlani was also able to contribute three points (two goals) to the tournament victory in the pre-Olympic qualifying. Born in Vermont (USA), at 33 years old she is the Alpine women's most experienced player.
The Italian team is very young in goal. Elisa Biondi (HC Ambrì-Piotta Girls) is the oldest player at 22 years old. There doesn't seem to be a fixed number 1. Ilaria Girardi (16/Bozen) and Martina Fedel (18/Brinkens IF U18) could also be used.
The head coach of the Italian team is Massimo Fedrizzi. The 53-year-old was himself an Italian national player, has been coaching women's ice hockey since 2006 and most recently looked after the Swiss girls' club teams from HC Ambrì-Piotta and the Ladies Team Lugano.
Denmark
If the world rankings are anything to go by, then the game on Sunday will decide the Olympic qualification. Team Denmark is currently in eleventh place in the world rankings, just three places behind the German women.
However, the Danes were recently unable to win against the German team in both the friendly match for the World Cup and during the tournament in Calgary. The results were 4:3 nP and 3:1. In addition, the players from our northern neighboring country were not really able to convince at the World Cup and ended up in tenth place with zero points and 3:15 goals. That was certainly no surprise, as Denmark was a newcomer to the top World Cup group.
The absolute leader of Denmark is Josefine Jakobsen. She has been playing for her country since 2008, moved to Sweden in the same year, then played in the NCAA and, since her return to Europe in 2015, for the traditional Swedish club Djurgardens IF. She was voted one of the team's best players at the World Cup in August, along with Josefine Persson and goalkeeper Cassandra Repstock-Romme. All three are of course also there in Füssen and are top performers. The most experienced player should not go unmentioned. Simone Jacquet Thrysoe has already competed in eleven world championships and also an Olympic qualifying tournament with the Danish team in 2013.
The head coach for the Danes is the Swede Peter Elander. The 61-year-old took part in the Olympic Games as head coach for the women from Sweden in 2006 and 2010. He has been looking after the Danish national team since 2019 in addition to his work at the Swedish men's fourth division club Jonstorps IF.
According to reports, the Danes prepared very carefully for the tournament. But this certainly applies to all three teams, because the dream of the Olympics will release a lot of energy.