The German women's national team lost to the team from Finland in the second game of the 2023 IIHF Women's World Championship. The DEB-Selection had to admit defeat to the favorites in Group B with 0:3. After two intense games, the team around women's national coach Thomas Schädler will have a day off tomorrow.
In this second game of preliminary group B, Johanna May started in goal for the German women's national team on Friday evening. After just 1:20 minutes, the German team made their first power play of this encounter and worked hard into the opponent's third. Finland continued to be dangerous when they were outnumbered and constantly put pressure on the goal area in front of May. In the seventh minute, the team again had the advantage DEB-Women, but the German team had increasing difficulties keeping the puck in the Finnish third. In the 14th minute, Rosa Lindstedt took advantage of the first Finnish power play and gave her team a 1-0 lead. As the game progressed, Germany continued to put a lot of pressure on their own goal. Just a few moments after Finland's first goal, there was a lot of traffic in front of Johanna May's German goal area. She was unable to secure the puck and so it was Emilia Vesa who brought the puck behind the goal line and thus Finland's lead to 2-0 expanded. Despite Finland's lead, both teams went into the first break with an even goal shooting ratio of 9:7 from a Finnish perspective.
In the second third, too, Finland worked aggressively in front of the German goal and gave it DEB-Team hardly any room to get out of their own zone. Nevertheless, Germany tried not to let themselves be disturbed and tried with all their might to gain possession of the target. Meanwhile, Finland continued to increasingly prevent the German team from building up. After half the game, Vivi Vainikka pushed the disc over Johanna May's left shoulder, increasing the score to 3-0 from a Finnish perspective.
At the end of the game the pace didn't let up. The DEB-Women now tried to be a little more courageous in forechecking and find their way back into the game with full strength. After a long period of pressure from the Finns, Germany was also able to advance again with some strong actions from Luisa Welcke and Bernadette Karpf. However, Finland continued to lead the game with many shots, which Johanna May blocked and was able to keep the score at 0:3 from the German perspective until the end of regular time. Daria Gleißner was then named the best German player of the game.
Women’s national coach Thomas Schädler: “The Finns have a strong team, so I have to pay even more respect to my team today, what a good performance the team showed again today and how hard they worked, especially in defense. We want to win the next game against France. We know what we have to bring on the ice and if we perform at our best, we will win against France. The team is now eager to reach the quarter-finals and is very focused.”
Striker Laura Kluge: “We showed again today that we put a lot of passion and will into this game. We didn't shy away from any challenge and went into the game hard. In the game against France we want to continue exactly where we left off in the last two games and continue to play our game.”
On the night from Sunday to Monday the German team will continue with the game against France. MagentaSport will also broadcast this party live and free of charge from 01 a.m. at night.