EBEL - preview of the 3rd round

The Vienna Capitals scored 5 goals in Sunday's home game against Linz. That wasn't enough to win, though, since they let 7 pucks into their own net. Surely the coaching stuff, players and fans expect to improve on that statistic tonight when Villach comes to Vienna. Villach seems to be out of form at the beginning of the season: a loss at home to Olimpija Ljubljana was unexpected, but a win in Hungary sorted things a bit. Villach, of course, hopes to win for the second time in a row on the road. 

League champion Red Bull Salzburg are at home to Hungarian champion Sapa Fehervar AV19. The Red Bulls, as usual, have had a quiet start to the season. They were humiliated in their opening match against KAC and then were idle in the second round. Tonight's game against Sapa is their opener for the home crowd. Although the Hungarians are very strong on defence and they are currently in fourth place in the league, anything but a win for the home team would be a big surprise.

The fifth of tonight's games is, of course, the Slovenian Classic. The Slovenian teams are in totally different positions after the first two rounds. Olimpija won both games and Jesenice lost both of their games. The Steelers from Jesenice had all sorts of problems during the pre-season, with players coming and leaving. The team is not synchronized yet. They'll be missing a few important players tonight as well, but they surely hope to get better results. The world would surely be a better place to live if they manage to win over their traditional rivals Olimpija in Ljubljana tonight. Olimpija's plans are completely different, of course. There were no big words during pre-season from Tivoli, as the team was carefully preparing and have looked good early in the regular season. Olimpija surprisingly won their opening game in Villach and managed to come from behind in the final period against Graz to win again. They expect many of their fans to be present in Tivoli tonight. The game, of course, is getting a lot of attention in the Slovenian media; it is sometimes considered to be the biggest derby in Slovenian sport.

 

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