EHM The Blue Line

3 KHL teams coming to the UK next April?

Apparently as Team GB opponents.

Dinamo Riga come over in 6th February (Coventry), Torpedo 27th & 28th April in Nottingham and Sheffield, respectively. I may try and get to the Sheffield game

A free (& legal) stream of Nottingham - Sheffield this evening : https://youtu.be/rUG7QsE04aU

Faceoff is at 7 pm GMT (8 pm CET, 2 pm Eastern US) and the Panthers have former Minnesota /St. Louis/Colorado forward Chris Stewart icing, while Sheffield are coached by Stanley Cup winner Tom Barrasso

So it sounds like EPL v2.0 is in the works for next season. I wonder if we'll see MK back in the EPL next year...

Following a consultation process with teams the NIHL Management Group (NLMG) have circulated their proposal to clubs for the structure of the league in the 2019-20 season.

Outline plans have been accepted by the board of EIHA and will be put to all clubs at a face to face meeting later this month.

The proposal includes a new top division which will sit above the current Division 1 in North and South.

The NLMG are also looking to see if any new applications will be forthcoming to join the NIHL structure whether they are new teams or second teams from existing clubs.

An NLMG spokesman said: “We are grateful to the clubs for their patience while this process has followed its course.

“The result is a viable structure which we believe has the support of all interested parties.

“We look forward to seeing all club representatives at the meeting where the aim is to have all divisions planned so everyone knows where they stand for next season.

“Details on the final agreed structure will be published as soon as possible after the meeting.”

Source: https://eiha.co.uk/nihl-proposed-struct ... e-meeting/

I can't believe Guildford overturned the first leg loss against Glasgow to win on the road. Am looking forward to seeing them play at the POFW next Saturday for the first time ever! I can't imagine we will beat Belfast but it'll still be a fun game.

I was surprised at close the Guildford v Belfast game was today. I expect Belfast to give us a beating but actually we had most of the best chances in the game. It's simply that when Belfast pressed hard in the third, they got the goals they needed. Otherwise there were a number of times we came so close to scoring further goals. I was also surprised at how we didn't really tire like many other teams tend to against the bigger teams.

The Cardiff v Nottingham game was one of the weirder semis I've seen. I never would have expected to see Nottingham lose 9-4 in a semi but their defence and netminder were generally very poor. Conversely, Charles Linglet had a cracking game and scored four for Cardiff. This one was particularly impressive:

Something a bit different: https://www.facebook.com/swindon.wildca ... =2&theater

archibalduk wrote: Tue Apr 30, 2019 7:22 pm Something a bit different: https://www.facebook.com/swindon.wildca ... =2&theater

I've never seen anything like that before! Goalies shooting I've seen (at each other or at targets), but not actual goalies scrimmaging!

Another season in the books!

Cardiff & Belfast were by far the best teams in the league this year, no one else had the consistency or quality that they had. I was surprised that Cardiff didn't win the league, losing to MK & Manchester in the last few weeks of the season. Guildford I think were the best of the rest

It was surprising that Nottingham sacked Rich Chernomaz (who went back to the DEL2 and won the playoffs ) not giving him a bit more time. Looks like there's some big changes in Nottingham, with Gui Doucet coming in as Director of Hockey and a separate head coach. The first time for them that the Head Coach won't be in charge of recruitment (copying Belfast & Cardiff a bit).

Sheffield also have a new Coach/GM after a rubbish season, Thompson started very poorly, Barrasso didn't improve them much and wasn't interested in the recruiting side of things. Thompson is now in the DEL with Schwenninger, he did okay last season improving their record after he took over. It will be interesting to see how he gets on.

Pretty rubbish season for the Storm, too many suspensions and penalties. We had the 3rd best home record in the season, but we could barely win away and missed out on the playoffs. Not many returnees next season, Byers, Moffatt, and Bakker all retiring and Long leaving (probably for Belfast). Ginn is back and hopefully we can keep hold of Hammond (57 assists in 53 games!), not fussed about too many others really. Good to see we've signed Finlay Ulrick, who played well for GB U-18s a couple of seasons ago.

Finally, it wouldn't be an off-season in British Hockey without one team basically going bust and changing leagues. Interesting off season in Milton Keynes by the looks of things, I hope they can continue in the EIHL but the current situation isn't great with the Moody's and the new group.

Good to see a reorganisation of the NIHL, the old setup wasn't competitive save a few teams at the top.

Liam Kirk had a pretty good year in the OHL, he struggled to adjust at the beginning of the season going 13 straight games without a point but ended up wiht 26 goals and 21 assists in 61 games. Hopefully he can improve again next season

Great to see Team GB back with the big boys this year after 25 years, even if it isn't going to be pretty Their final warmup game is today against Slovakia (stream here: https://twitter.com/TeamGBicehockey/sta ... 0816517120 ). I watched one of the warmup games against Torpedo (on TV), we looked good in parts but faded in and out a bit. We seemed to struggle with the aggressive forecheck at times. The WC games are:

11th May v Germany
12th May v Canada
14th May v Denmark
15th May v USA
17th May v Finland
18th May v Slovakia
20th May v France

So this is getting a bit interesting:

Planet Ice would like to take this opportunity to express its disappointment with the Elite League and their decision to refuse the granting of a licence to the new Milton Keynes consortium for next season onwards. As a result, Planet Ice will be reviewing its future relationship with all Elite League teams operating from it’s buildings and an official statement on their decision will be released after 5pm on Friday May 10th.

Heath Rhodes
Chief Operations Officer for Planet Ice

AFAIK Coventry and Manchester are the other Planet Ice teams.

I've no sympathy for PI on this one. The EIHL cannot be expected to admit a team put together at the last minute like this. Would they really be willing to drop to the new National League? This is likely to be very different to the old EPL which had very generous import limits.

I've no sympathy for PI on this one. The EIHL cannot be expected to admit a team put together at the last minute like this. Would they really be willing to drop to the new National League? This is likely to be very different to the old EPL which had very generous import limits.

Me either. I also think the league would prefer to have 10 teams rather than 11 to reduce the number of midweek games which are traditionally poorly attended. I thin attendances reduced last season (although with Edinburgh dropping the league wide average increased). Fortunately I'm not getting a season ticket next season anyway, but I'd certainly be holding off if I was.

Players coming out saying they've not been paid, plus some interesting claims about tax, mean it must be game over for the Moody's now. I cannot see the EIHA letting them play in the NIHL with all of these allegations, plus there's plenty of unhappy sponsors on their supporters club Facebook page. From a selfish perspective, I hope that they play in the EIHL next season.

It will be interesting to see whether a fans consortium will work in the long run, but they must be better than the current owners.

Yes I completely agree. There's no way the EIHA can realistically allow MK to compete in the NIHL with all of these claims circulating and the sponsors pulling out. The Moodys have been very vocal throughout the season when various claims against their management were made. Given their silence and the impending strike-off of the holding company, this must mean that they have packed it in.

I'm not all that sure about the "new" MK being proposed for the EIHL. The person behind the idea only came up with it recently following a discussion with Tim Wallace. They then put the bid/proposal together in six weeks. This sounds like a real rush and who's to say that this consortium will be any better than the Moodys. I think the EIHL were right to reject the proposal given the rush job. I wouldn't be surprised if we're seeing a repeat of the MK situation this time next year in the event EIHL decides to admit them for the 2019/20 season.

This is a fairly interesting read: https://chasingthepuck.com/lets-play-ho ... s4ohE7Otbk

archibalduk wrote: Fri May 10, 2019 8:21 pm Yes I completely agree. There's no way the EIHA can realistically allow MK to compete in the NIHL with all of these claims circulating and the sponsors pulling out. The Moodys have been very vocal throughout the season when various claims against their management were made. Given their silence and the impending strike-off of the holding company, this must mean that they have packed it in.

I'm not all that sure about the "new" MK being proposed for the EIHL. The person behind the idea only came up with it recently following a discussion with Tim Wallace. They then put the bid/proposal together in six weeks. This sounds like a real rush and who's to say that this consortium will be any better than the Moodys. I think the EIHL were right to reject the proposal given the rush job. I wouldn't be surprised if we're seeing a repeat of the MK situation this time next year in the event EIHL decides to admit them for the 2019/20 season.

This is a fairly interesting read: https://chasingthepuck.com/lets-play-ho ... s4ohE7Otbk

I thought 6 weeks was probably a long time to come up with a Business plan in British Hockey I did watch most of the facebook stream of the meeting, as I had 3 hours to kill this evening chaning airplanes, and I thought the consortium came across pretty well, they certainly looked like they'd done their homework and the fact they'd worked pretty closely with existing league board members, and altered their plans on advice, was also encouraging. I think the biggest reservation I can think of is what happens if they need more money as they don't appear to have 1 major backer who can put their hands into their pockets in case of disaster.

It sounds as though a decision will happen soon

I'm glad the Denmark - GB game was on during work hours, otherwise I would've watched it

Planet Ice have said that the NIHL ice time contract will go to the new MK consortium, so looks like the Moodys are on the way out. Another couple of players have come out saying they're owed money (about £7500 in total) and they are being evicted from their house and they no longer have a car... Very bad situation.

LSL strike off got suspended today, I'm assuming on their creditors objected to it. I assume liquidation will follow, but I doubt there will be much money for anyone out of pocket

So the new Leeds team will be called Leeds Chiefs... It seems a shame that they didn't go for something that related to the history of Leeds rather than a generic name.

archibalduk wrote: Wed May 15, 2019 8:44 pm So the new Leeds team will be called Leeds Chiefs... It seems a shame that they didn't go for something that related to the history of Leeds rather than a generic name.

At least it is better than the Mighty Mammoths...

Very true!

There were some attempts by fans of other teams to game the vote, looks like they ignored the vote anyway. Mighty Mammoths was by far the best name