The German national ice hockey team achieved its second victory in the third World Cup preparation game on Thursday evening in Rosenheim. In front of around 2000 spectators in the ROFA Stadium in Rosenheim, Stefan Loibl, Alexander Karachun, Danjo Leonhardt and Daniel Schmölz scored the goals for the hosts.
The first home international match in preparation for the 2022 World Championship in Finland took place in an ice hockey stadium with a long tradition. Not only do the numbers and names of ice hockey legends such as Karl Friesen, Mondi Hilger, Ernst Höfner, Ron Fischer and Wacki Kretschmer hang under the roof of the ROFA Stadium, Rosenheim and its Starbulls are also the only German club to have trained two current NHL players: Philipp Grubauer (Seattle Kraken) and Lukas Reichel (Chicago Blackhawks). Both, however, are still working in the North American professional league and were not present today.
Daniel Pietta led the team onto the ice as captain, with Stefan Loibl and Fabio Wagner at his side. Niklas Treutle started in goal for the German team, as he did a week ago in Chomutov. And the Nuremberg keeper had a little more to do in the first period than his counterpart, Melvin Nyffeler from Rapperswil. Both keepers, however, kept their net clean.
Four goals were scored in the middle third. Particularly nice to watch, especially from a German perspective, was Stefan Loibl's 1:1 in the 25th minute. First, Daniel Schmölz won the puck well, passed it across, Loibl made his opponent look old with a strong move and smashed the puck into the top right corner. Miranda had previously put the Icemen in the lead. Fazzini then managed the same feat again with a lot of luck in the 32nd minute. But again the German team had an answer ready. Alexander Karachun had already earned this equalizer through hard work beforehand, and was later voted the German team's player of the game.
The winner, however, was someone else. Danjo Leonhardt, who is still from Salzburg, scored into the opponent's goal for the first time in his second international match. With a shot from a central position, he beat Philip Wüthrich, who had come to the final third, in the 49th minute. And ten minutes later, when Wüthrich had left the ice in favor of a sixth field player, Daniel Schmölz, the goal machine, also scored his goal. The third goal in a row was a shot into the deserted Swiss net.
The statistics: Match report – GER vs. SUI – 21.04.22/21/22 (A national team men XNUMX/XNUMX) (gamepitch.de)
Voices about the game
National coach Toni Söderholm: “Our commitment was very good today. Everyone played with commitment. A few little things caused us problems in the build-up to the game. It's sometimes a fine line when you defend aggressively... I liked Niklas in goal. But the most important thing is that when the level of commitment is as it is today, we have options.”
Winning goalscorer Danjo Leonhardt about the game today: “In my opinion, the first third belonged a little more to Switzerland. They played very physical and we had to get used to it, but it worked well. The second third was very even, and in the third third we showed that we can play ice hockey.”