Russia blanks Germany to honor World War II veterans

08 May 2012 | Roman Solovyev

Thirty saves by Semyon Varlamov, two points by Nikolai Zherdev helped Russians beat Germany 2-0 at the day before the Victory Day in Russia, which is celebrated at May 9.

Team Russia played in the third game at the World Championship with the same line-up as in the game against Norway with goalie Semyon Varlamov in the net. Germany head coach Jakob Kölliker credits goal post to Dimitri Kotschnew who played last 4 seasons in KHL but will start new in DEL.

Germany didn’t have any advantage in first 20 minutes but managed to make 13 shots on Russian’s net and outshot their opponents. The most dangerous shot was made by Christoph Schubert, but Varlamov stopped it with his glove. There was a shortage of real scoring chances, but with 9 seconds remaining Zherdev re-directed a puck from Yevgeny Medvedev’s blast from the board – 1:0.

The next period continued in the same way. Russia took a little possession which can’t convert in any goals. Germans played first half too bad allowing Russians to skate in their own zone. To the end of the second they moved the game to Russian zone due to Alexander Perezhogin’s penalty for interference.

In the middle of the third Russia used a PP chance. Alexei Tereshchenko used assists from Shirokov and Zherdev to add the puck into free corner of the net. Germany made a last-minutes siege on Russian’s net. Alexei Yemelin helped to make it with a 2-minute penalty for holding. The similar episode happened when Fischer’s blast from the blue line was stopped by Varlamov’s glove like in first period. It was last thing that can threat Varlamov who made a first shootout at this championship.

Russia won the third of three games and caught Sweden in the standings of the Stockholm group. Tomorrow Germany will face with the host team of this group, when Russian will play next game only on Thursday against Denmark.