The SHL playoffs are underway.
And SVT expert Jonas Andersson is really upset about the arrangement.
– It’s a stupid, stupid rule, he says in SVT.
However, the icon Håkan Loob does not agree at all.
After months of longing, the SHL playoffs are finally underway. On Thursday, the round of 16 began, and we got to see an unexpected result right away, when Örebro, who was just a penalty shootout away from missing the playoffs in the very last round of the regular season, won against Luleå.
Great criticism
This means that Luleå must now win two matches in a row – otherwise the season is over. In the second round of 16, Rögle won against Timrå, and thus the Ängelholms team is only one game away from playing on in the quarter-finals. The round of 16 is therefore played in the best of three, but that is not what Jonas Andersson is so upset about.
In the Round of 16, the lower-ranked team from the regular season starts at home, followed by two straight home games for the higher-ranked team. In SVT’s “Hockey Night”, Andersson and the icon Håkan Loob ended up in a discussion about the system, and Andersson called the whole thing a “stupid, stupid rule”.
Loob’s answer
Andersson takes Luleå as an example, which thus lost the first match, which was away from home, even though they came higher in the regular season.
– It is so sportingly weak. I will bring it up until they change this stupid, stupid rule, Andersson says.
But the icon Håkan Loob does not agree at all. Instead, he believes that it is “mentally weak” not to be able to handle the current system.
– You still have to believe in yourself when you enter the playoffs. And the number one thing is to believe that you can win at home. If you lose away, have you suddenly become so mentally weak that you can’t win at home either? All tendencies are meant to be broken, he says.
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