Poland surprises Belarus

Belarus and Poland opened the qualifying tournament for the Beijing 2022 Olympics today at the Ondrej Nepela Arena in Bratislava.

As was to be expected, the group is confirmed to be very balanced and each match will probably be decided on a detail. And Poland causes the first surprise by snatching the three points from the favoured Belarus

The Belarus of Canadian coach Craig Woodcroft is on the ice as the most difficult opponent for the hosts of Slovakia, but Poland, accredited with small chances of qualification, showed an excellent organization and a lot of discipline. The Belarus roster is certainly of higher quality, but on the ice, it has proven to be more of a series of individuals than a team.

After a first period without many emotions, the game becomes interesting in the central period, with two goalkeepers, curiously both naturalized North Americans, engaged on several occasions and Belarus surviving two numerical inferiorities.

In the last period the balance is broken when there are 5 minutes to go: Filip Komorski finalizes a counterattack by collecting a pass from Alan Lyszczarczyk, beating a not perfect Taylor. As mentioned, it is a match that is resolved for one detail: there is no more time to recover and the Polish defence resists the final onslaught of the Belarusians who finish the game without a goalkeeper

MVP: Danny Taylor - John Murray

Tweets by @eurohockey