Czech party crashers blank Russia in opener

The first minutes were dominated by Russia. The Czechs did not even get out of their period and had to withstand huge pressure from the Russian side. The first relieve came after 5 minutes through a bench penalty against Russia for too many men on the ice. As soon as the penalty ticked off the clock, the game shifted back into the Czech end.

A tripping penalty against Sergei Kalinin finally led to a very surprising 1-0 lead for the Czech Republic at the 14:48 minute mark. Tomas Kundratek received the puck on the right face-off circle from veteran Jan Kovar and his shot slipped through the pads of Sergei Bobrovski. With that shock and another tripping penalty on the clock Russia had to return to the locker rooms.

48 seconds into the second period the Czechs turned their third powerplay into their second goal. Jakub Jerabek took a slapshot from the blue line and the rebound off Bobrovski ended up on Roman Cervenka's stick, who converted it for the 2-0.

Cervenka scored the important 2-0 goal. Photo: Michal Eger

With rising confidence the Czechs started to become a more and more uncomfortable opponent for the hosts. The game was turned upside down as the Czech Republik was now pushing towards a third goal. The Sbornaja only managed to revive their offensive game at the end of the period, but the score of 2-0 stood heading into the second intermission. The biggest chance for Russia came shortly after a powerplay when Mozyakin hit the cross bar.

Higher intensity and a couple of penalties against the Czech Republic helped Russia to regain their dominance over the game in the third period, but a well moving PK unit and goalie Dominik Furch kept the shutout alive. Avangard Omsk's netminder turned aside 25 shots in total to achieve a rare feat as the Sbornaja did not have many games in World Championship history in which they could not score once. The decision came with an empty net goal through Michal Birner 92 seconds away from the final horn.

Russia will look to get their first goal of the tournament against Kazakhstan on sunday, while the Czechs try to make it better than Sweden against Latvia tomorrow evening.

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