Today, the CHL is an established part of the European hockey calendar.
As the CHL enters its second decade, it kicks into a higher amid several changes, most of them behind the scenes. In March, it was announced that Martin Baumann, the only CEO the league has ever known would leave the CHL, Communication and Digital Media Director Monika Reinhard was named the new Chief Operating Office, and the board will only have five members going forward, instead of nine, to make the CHL a more agile organization.
A new member on the board is Veli-Pekka Marin, the CEO and co-founder of Uplause, a sports technology company and vice chairman of TPS Turku. He will join CHL President Jörgen Lindgren, Henrik Bach Nielsen, Patrick Lengwiler, and Miha Butara on the board.
The anniversary season is played in the same format as last season, when the number of participating teams was dropped to 24. As last season, all teams drew two opponents from the three other pools in a system that creates a competitive and exciting league. The first round of playoffs will see the top-seeded team take on the 16th placed team and so on.
Rickard Wallin, the GM of Swedish Farjestad, summed up the charm of the CHL when he analyzed his team’s draw luck.
“The two Finnish teams will be tough, but we’ve also got a Norwegian team, a Hungarian team and an Austrian team, which are all teams we don’t know too much about,” he said.
And he’s right, the two Finnish teams probably will be tough opponents as they happen to be the two Finnish Liiga finalists from last season, Lahti Pelicans and Tampere Tappara, the only team to have qualified for the CHL every year.
While Wallin doesn’t know too much about their Hungarian opponents, Fehérvár’s coach knows something about Farjestad.
“Farjestad have a great defence, and it will be tough to break through them. It will be a challenge, but I believe our team can rise to the occasion and show what we are capable of,” head coach David Kiss said.
And if not Farjestad, maybe Kiss’s team can surprise Dynamo Pardubice ?
“We haven’t faced Czech teams at this level before. It’s rare for a Hungarian…
Click Here to Read the Full Original Article at Rss News…