Sports News

Sports News

Czechs beaten by Slovakia in Ice-hockey World Championship bronze-medal match

Czechs beaten by Slovakia, photo: CTK

Only a few dozen Czech ice hockey fans came to Ruzyne airport on Sunday to greet the Czech national team returning from the Ice Hockey World Championship in Helsinki. After Canada beat the Czech Republic 8-4 in the semi-final on Friday, the Czechs faced their former federation partner Slovakia in Saturday's bronze-medal match. Slovakia, last year's gold medallists, beat the Czech Republic 4-2 and took the bronze. Peter Bondra's goal at 5:20 in the second period broke the deadlock, with Slovakia eventually gaining the victory. Miroslav Satan, Pavol Demitra and Jozef Stumpel also scored for the Slovaks, while Jan Hlavac and Robert Reichel scored for the Czechs.

Slovak national team, photo: CTK

Saturday's match was the first time the Slovaks beat the Czech team at the world championship, and the Czechs - defeated by last year's champions - came home without a medal for the second time in a row. Coach Slavomir Lener blames the result on a bad start of the semi-final against Canada, which ended in great disappointment for the team as they had believed they had had every chance to win. Czech fans were also disappointed and few came to watch Saturday's match in pubs, neither was the game shown on the giant screens in Prague's Old Town Square where ice hockey fans have been used to coming to support Czech players ever since the Nagano Winter Olympics in 1998. Only a smattering of the most faithful fans staged a lukewarm welcome for the team, whose problem according to some might have been that sixteen of the twenty-five players were rookies at the world championship.

2004 Ice Hockey World Championship groups drawn

Staying with ice hockey, and the preliminary round groupings for the 2004 world ice hockey championship to be held in Prague were drawn on Friday by the International Ice Hockey Federation. The Czech Republic will play Germany, Latvia and Kazakhstan in group A. The tournament will open on April 24 and end on May 9 at the newly built ice-hockey arena in the Prague district of Vysocany.

Nedved takes applause as Juventus triumph again

Moving on to football, and Czech midfielder Pavel Nedved became Italy's league champion for the third time on Saturday. Nedved ran to the fans carrying a giant flag bearing the number 27 after his club Juventus won their 27th title on Saturday. His goals and all-round effervescent play have been pivotal in what could yet prove one of the club's most memorable seasons with a place in the Champions League final also up for grabs. Determination is Nedved's most visible quality on the field and his ambition was revealed when within minutes of the "scudetto" win he turned his thoughts to Wednesday's game with Real Madrid.