SAPPORO, Japan – Ukraine swept over the promoted Croats in the tournament opener while Hungary had a narrow win against Estonia. Hosts Japan had a perfect start in the evening game with a 5-0 against Lithuania.
Lithuania – Japan 0-5 (0-4, 0-0, 0-1)Japan wanted immediately to prove to their fans in the packed Sapporo Arena that the team has the ambition to compete with Ukraine and Hungary for promotion to the 2009 World Championship in Switzerland. The hosts scored four unanswered goals in a furious opening period and they never looked back. Although, never really of promotion calibre, Lithuania has recently proved to be a very difficult opponent for the best teams on this level, but they were fundamentally outplayed during the first 20 minutes, and also outshot 17-8.
Japan struck with goals approximately every fourth minute. After Yosuke Kon’s opener at 4:23, Masahito Nishiwaki (9:09) and Sho Sato (12:55) connected with power-play goals before Darcy Mitani finished the rampage at 18:02 with the 4-0 marker.
The middle stanza was scoreless despite several Japanese power-play opportunities after the Lithuanians showed some poor composure, taking slashing, boarding and roughing minors.
Ryuchi Kawai got his team’s third PP-goal early in the third to extinguish all hopes of a miraculous Lithuanian comeback. The Lithuanians continued to show frustration by taking bad penalties. Goaltender Nerijus Dauksevicius displayed the worst tempers when taking a 10-minute misconduct penalty (protesting an obvious call) with seven minutes left. Masahito Haruna got the shut-out, making 19 saves.
Estonia – Hungary 3-5 (1-2, 2-1, 0-2)Hungary, who is looking for promotion to the top division, escaped with a scare in their opening game against an inspired and industrious Estonian team. It looked like the audience at the Sapporo arena would witness an upset when Aleksandr Polozov’s shot bounced off goaltender Levente Super’s mask and into the net 14 minutes into the middle period, as this somewhat fluky goal gave Estonia a 3-2 lead.
But it was veteran Casaba Kovacs who saved the day for Hungary with his two goals at the time when his team needed them the most. Kovacs equalised less then one minute before the last intermission and he also got the game winner 5:30 into the last stanza. The two goals was a logic result from Hungary’s determined effort. The Estonians applied some very good pressure at the Hungarian net at the end, but Daniel Fekete’s 5-3-goal at 11:03 proved to the killer.
And this is what Estonia often does to the best Division I teams; gives them a tough fight until the end, but only occasionally do they have the depth to go all the way. Marton Vas had two goals for Hungary in the first period, while Maksim Ivanov and Andrei Makrov tallied for Estonia. Hungary won the shots on goal, 41-27.
Hungary, here with Andras Benk, was stronger than the Estonians. Photo: Seinosuke UchigasakiCroatia – Ukraine 0-4 (0-1, 0-1, 0-2)The Ukrainian national team, which was relegated from the World Championship in Russia in 2007 after many years with the elite nations, began the IIHF World Championship Division I Group B in Japan with a 4-0 sweep against Croatia.
The Ukrainians went into the game as the favourite as Croatia was promoted from Division II last year. Ukraine put a lot of pressure on Croatia’s goalkeeper Vanja Belic in the beginning with 22-7 shots in the first period. At 7:34, the first goal was missed by hitting the crossbar on empty net. Just one minute later, the score was 1-0 for Ukraine thanks to Yuriy Dyachenko’s goal.
Croatia was dominated during the whole game but had some chances with counter-attacks. The resistance was braking during the game with Dmytro Tsyrul scoring in the middle period. Vadym Shakhraychuk and Oleksandr Karaulshchuk extended the score to 4-0 within 21 seconds in the third period.
Oleksandr Karaulshchuk and his Ukrainian team-mates put much pressure on the Croatian defence. Photo: Seinosuke UchigasakiClick here for the game’s photo gallery.Click here for scores and statistics.IIHF STAFF
