The German women's national team suffered a defeat in their placement match at the 2023 IIHF Women's World Championship in Canada. The team led by women's national coach Thomas Schädler lost 2:8 to the team from Finland. Goal scorers for the DEBThe selections were Sonja Weidenfelder (11th) and Theresa Wagner (22nd).
The German team leaves Canada with a strong World Cup performance overall. The exact ranking depends on the match between Japan and Sweden. If Japan wins, the DEB-Selection seventh place - if the Swedes win, the German women will be eighth in the World Cup.
In this placement game for the German team, the selection led by women's national coach Thomas Schädler got off to a good start and at times established themselves clearly in the Finnish zone. In the 9th minute, a penalty from the Finns enabled the first power play on the German side. Meanwhile, the first strong shot of the DEB-Women was still between the goal line and the puck thanks to Anni Keisala's pad, Sonja Weidenfelder was able to successfully use the puck for the first time for the German team a few seconds later with a backhand shot. Finland didn't let this initial shock sit for long and Jenniina Nylund scored the equalizer just 15 seconds later. At the end of the first 20 minutes, Germany also had to go to the penalty box for the first time because of a hook by Carina Strobel, but up until then it was a game of equals.
With one more player on the ice, the Finnish team came back into the game more aggressively and took advantage of their majority. 35 seconds into the second period, Petra Nieminen gave her team the lead for the first time. But Germany also follows suit with the Finns, as they did in the first part of the game. Resi Wagner shot the target past Anni Keisala just 74 seconds after Finland's opening goal, enabling the German women's national team to equalize. But then came that DEB-Selection stumbled and spent increasing amounts of time in the penalty box. Petra Nieminen took advantage of the Germans' carelessness twice and turned the game back to 26-29 in Finland's favor with her goals in the 4th and 2th minutes.
Even in the last third of the match, Germany had difficulty keeping up with the pace and pressure of the Finnish team. Julia Liikala (46th) and Jenni Hiirikoski (49th) enabled Finland to celebrate another goal. With the goal from Emilia Vesa, who already scored in the first meeting between the two teams, the German team made a change in the goalkeeper position in the 50th minute. Johanna May now took her place between the German posts for Sandra Abstreiter, who had performed really well in this World Cup so far. Shortly before time expired, Nelli Laitinen (60) added another Finnish goal to the scoreboard.
Women’s national coach Thomas Schädler: “Today's conclusion wasn't what we had imagined, but we can still be proud of what we achieved at this World Cup. We can be more than satisfied with three preliminary round wins and the good quarter-final game against the USA. I draw a very positive conclusion from the World Cup and we can be proud of this achievement. Despite the defeat today, we will take the positive impressions with us into the future.”
Striker Laura Kluge: “We had some good games at this World Cup and definitely showed that we are heading in the right direction. Of course, the disappointment is great right now and the defeat was a bit too great, but in the end we can be very proud of our performance.”