Germany hung with the pre-favorites of the World Cup, Sweden, more than halfway through the third period. Then Gabriel Kohonen’s bat swung.
Henri Pitkänen,
Hinn Hirvonen
12.12. 21:13•Updated 12.12. 21:24
The Men’s World Floorball Championships will be held in Malmö, Sweden, from 7 to 15. december shows all matches in Finland on its channels.
The broadcast of Finland’s quarter-final against Norway starts on Friday the 13th at 8 p.m.
Germany was to organize the biggest giant bang in the history of floorball at the men’s World Cup in Malmö.
Germany, who lost 4-19 to Sweden in the last games, hung level with the World Cup host Sweden for more than half of the third period, until the sports legend Mika Kohonen boy, representing Sweden Gabriel Kohonen shot wonderfully into the back top corner for a 3-2 deciding goal.
Malte Lundmark hit from the counterattack 4–2 and Robin Nilsberth into an empty net Final scores 5–2. For Kohonen, who started the match from the bench, the goal was the third in his first World Cup tournament.
– A hard and difficult match. We didn’t get to our level, but there are games like that sometimes and the most important thing was to win, Kohonen said after the match.
– My goal was important, but only because the team wins.
Sweden, which was in the midst of a coaching crisis, lost to Finland 2–5 on Tuesday, and the loss was the first ever at home at the World Cup level. The Germany game was also a really painful struggle throughout the match.
– I’m not satisfied because these are the home games in Sweden and of course it would be important to get a good feeling. We know we’ll find our level as long as the most important games come and it’s going to be great.
– We need to find a killer instinct and try to get more balls in. Scoring has been our problem, Kohonen concluded.
The match schedule frustrated Germany in the camp
On the German side, a great fight left only a bone in the hand in the end.
– Yes, you could see the superiority on the field, but we worked with great heart and covered our bets. There wasn’t a lot of energy in that bank, but we still managed to hustle and do the agreed things, a member of the German coaching team Ilkka Kittilä praised his own.
– Sweden did exactly the things that we had seen and we got them by our good performance and partly by their poor performance and by luck. That’s what it takes when the level difference is big, but I’m incredibly proud.
For Germany, the game was already the fifth in five days, while Sweden came into the game rested. The current game system frustrates the Finnish coach.
– When it has been said that the games would be tougher and that the same four countries (Sweden, Finland, Czech Republic and Switzerland) would not always be at the top, this does not help at all.
– This format has already been divided enough, and some solution should be found. The countries ranked 5–8, i.e. for example us, Slovakia and Latvia at the front, are actually already doing a better job.
Germany continues the tournament by playing from places 5–8. Sweden will face either the Czech Republic or Slovakia in Saturday’s semifinal.