Without an icon Thomas Koch – KAC welcomes Red Bull Salzburg to the hit
© Sports report
In the bet-at-home ICE Hockey League, the home game against Red Bull Salzburg is on the program for the KAC on Tuesday. The red jackets have to do without the club legend Thomas Koch. But one after anonther!
THE STARTING POINT:
The EC-KAC lacked consistency in the last rounds, defeats and victories have been alternating for five match days, which stands in the way of a sustainable improvement in the table position. The red jackets are currently in seventh place, the ranking purely from home games shows the defending champion only in ninth place: The Klagenfurters only got 23 out of 45 possible points in the city hall last season and lost three of the last four games on their own ice . In particular, the EC-KAC still lacks effectiveness in the offensive in the current season, although only one team conceded fewer goals per game with Salzburg, but only the bottom two from Linz (2.14 pro) and Dornbirn (2, 57) fewer goals than the Red Jackets (2.71).
EC Salzburg scored points in each of its last eleven league games and recorded a total of 23 of 28 matches in the current ICE game year. Since December 12th, the Mozartstadters have been in first place in the table, their point average is steadily approaching the 2,000 mark. Head coach Matt McIlvane’s squad has thus created a brilliant starting position for the rest of the regular season, and Salzburg is back in first place in the final classification of the regular season for the first time since 2015/16. The latest proof of the bulls’ good form was the dominant 8-2 home win against Fehérvár AV19 on Saturday. The league has won five times in a row while away from home, the last away defeat – 1: 3 at HC Orli Znojmo on October 26th – dates from a phase of the season in which they had to struggle with numerous injuries or illness-related absences. The Red Bulls last performed outstandingly on penalties: 18 of the last 19 undernumbered games were survived unscathed.
THE OPPONENT:
|| PLAYER IN FOCUS ||
The current top scorer of EC Salzburg is still a defender with TJ Brennan: The US-American currently has 31 points (13 goals, 18 assists) and is thus on a record course: Since Dan Bjornlie in the 2008/09 season, none has been in the league all year round committed defender more to a similarly high point average per game. In Saturday’s victory against Székesfehérvár, the Bulls’ first attack formation came to the fore: Peter Schneider, Thomas Raffl and Benjamin Nissner each scored three points, the latter was also on the ice for five of his teams’s eight goals. Born in Vienna, he also played big in the two previous season duels with the red jackets, he has three of Salzburg’s five goals. When it comes to matches played in Klagenfurt, the focus is always on goalie J.-P. Lamoureux, which has a checkered history with the town hall, was replaced there a total of eight times early in 25 career starts.
|| BALANCE SHEET AGAINST THE EC-KAC ||
Since the new league was founded in 2000, the EC-KAC has not been on the ice more often against any opponent than against EC Salzburg, although it only came in 2004 in the EBEL at that time: the duel on Tuesday is already 152nd between the two clubs. So far, the bulls prevailed 80 times, in 71 cases the red jackets had the better end for themselves. The total of 926 hits in confrontations between Salzburg and Klagenfurt split 482 to 444 in favor of the Mozartstadters. The EC-KAC average in direct encounters in the recent past has mostly done quite well: The Red Jackets were defeated in only two of the last twelve games against the Red Bulls in regular time, and Klagenfurt won nine of these twelve duels. In the city hall, Salzburg prevailed in seven of its most recent 15 appearances, but only two times managed to take the full three points. The tradition of city duels between Klagenfurt and Salzburg goes back well before the Red Bull involvement in ice hockey: Between 1972 and 1988, the record champions dueled in the then Bundesliga with HC Salzburg and later the Salzburg EC, 44 of the 57 matches were played Red-White (three draws, ten defeats).
|| THE LAST DUEL ||
Both previous season duels between the EM-KAC and the EM Salzburg ended 2-2 after regular playing time, the away team then increased in extra time or in the penalty shoot-out. Remarkable: Of the nine bull cracks who scored points against the red jackets today, four are not there on Tuesday because they are preparing for the U20 World Cup in Canada with their respective national teams (Lucas Thaler, Oskar Maier, Jakub Borzöcki , Danjo Leonhardt). The last encounter between bulls and red jackets took place on November 7, 2021 in the town hall: Thomas Hundertpfunde ensures a red-white 2-0 lead with a double in the first section, against a strong, weakened KAC team that played this In the evening only two import players included, but Salzburg equalized as the game continued and ultimately won with a Brennan goal in extra time. The cops They mainly the Klagenfurters in this duel like no other ICE opponent this year: came (against the EC-KAC, which has more time with puck control in 26 of its 28 season games than its respective opponent) to famous 63 percent target possession and recorded a goal shot ratio of 36:12 at Even Strength. Klagenfurt held up with a thinned lineup and was able to secure at least one point thanks to strength at the faceoff point (54 percent won throws) and in the duels (52 percent successful one-on-one battles).
THE PERSONNEL:
The EC-KAC has to do without Thomas Koch in the home game against his ex-club, who sustained a lower body injury in the game against Graz, the degree of which will only be revealed by further investigations on Monday afternoon. The center forward missed a league game for the first time since December 10, 2017, his streak of stakes in a row ends with 244 games. The failure of Koch results in personnel changes in two of the four storm formations: Matt Fraser moves to Rok Tičar and Nick Petersen, Lukas Haudum centers the wings Samuel Witting and Daniel Obersteiner. The last ailing David Maier is fully in training again, whether he WILL be part of the redjacket lineup again on Tuesday will be decided on the day of the match. The coaching staff is planning a line-up that includes seven defenders and 13 strikers.
THE COMMENT:
“Salzburg are of course a strong team with a lot of very good individual players and there is a reason why they are at the top of the table. In our situation, in which we don’t get rolling, it doesn’t really matter which team we’re facing, we Wannen first and foremost find a way back to our own game, that’s the focus at the moment. We are currently our biggest enemy ourselves, we win a game, then we lose another, we lack consistency and we have to bring back to death. Our team is a sworn community that has had a lot of success together, we know what makes us strong, but it’s not about knowing that, but about implementing it on the ice. And that for the full 60 or more minutes. “(Matt Fraser, striker EC-KAC)
Media information EC KAC
December 20, 2021