Six goals for the period, first place in the group and a meeting with the United States in the quarter finals: the Russian team beat Sweden at the World Hockey Championship

In the fact that the main match of the group round of the 2019 World Cup for the Russian team will be a meeting with the Swedes in the seventh round, there was not the slightest doubt even before the start of the tournament. At a minimum, a meeting with the “third crust” who started the tournament in Slovakia with the rank of the reigning champions of the planet should show how ready the team of Ilya Vorobyov is for the most serious challenges. After all, medal ambitions need to be confirmed precisely with confident victories over opponents of comparable level, among which the Scandinavians, of course, belong. But with a high degree of probability, the outcome of the match Sweden - Russia was to determine the team that will make it into the playoffs of the world forum from the first place in group B.

The final statistics of the World Cup group final match is # DreamsRussia # IIHFWorldspic.twitter.com / KlaG85WfDd

Russians who scored the highest possible 18 points in the previous six matches of the group stage, it was enough not to lose with a difference of three goals and larger to finish at the top of the table. At the same time, after the sensational victory of Germany over Finland, this was almost accompanied by a not entirely pleasant bonus in the form of a meeting with the US team in the quarterfinals.

But, of course, in the camp of the "red car" tournament mathematics were not engaged: in front of such a powerful team, which Vorobyov leads in Slovakia, it is simply indecent to set other goals than to win in each subsequent meeting. And the Swedes themselves added fuel to the fire, having opened the account already in the eighth minute of the reporting meeting. The captain of the Colorado Avalanche Club, who pleasantly surprised the current National Hockey League (NHL) national championship, did what he can do best: he took a good position and sent the puck into the net of Andrei Vasilevsky after throwing on the patch.

Even if the episode with the missed puck was bracketed, the starting segment of an important in many respects meeting of the Russian hockey players failed. They indecently rarely disturbed Jakob Markström, causing only five shots on target for the opening 20 minutes (with 10 for the Swedish team). And, even worse, already after the goal, Landeskog was twice removed for violating the rules in the attack zone, which cannot be allowed to take place in the matches for departure.

Fortunately, the inaccuracy of the Swedes and the high-quality game of Vasilevsky, whose confidence in their own strength had no effect on the local success of the opponent, would have helped to avoid big troubles - it would be much more difficult to play back the lag in two effective throws after the break.

Kaprizov's first goal in this championship # DreamsRussia # IIHFWorldspic.twitter.com / ugrr9JZ1Us

However, that Russia, which came out on the ice in the second period, was absolutely everything on the shoulder - after all, for the next 20 minutes, the Vorobiev wards spent, without exaggeration, phenomenally. The puck from the locker room by Artem Anisimov, which was the result of a quick attack with Nikita Kucherov and Nikita Gusev, became a turning point in the match: the national squad, it seemed, gained wings, added speed and played more relaxedly than at the beginning of the meeting. And a flurry of scoring chances did not take long.

The Swedes didn’t withstand the crazy pressure - Henrik Lundqvist, who remained on the bench of the super-veteran of the goalkeeper’s workshop, with sadness and melancholy in his eyes, watched his less stellar colleague miss six goals, one or two of which he could have prevented. But the Russian national team frankly caught courage after an interval of four minutes, Evgeni Dadonov and Alexander Ovechkin excelled.

And the Swedes limp, faced with fierce resistance. And they frankly gave up playing with the score 1: 4 - after Yevgeny Kuznetsov won a throw-in, Kirill Kaprizov made a beautiful goal, which became his first at the 2019 World Cup. After that, the Scandinavians made two gross mistakes in defense, for which they were punished by Mikhail Grigorenko and Yevgeny Malkin. At the same time, the latter reached the mark of 100 points in matches for the national team.

This is @ emalkin71geno and he has 1⃣0⃣0⃣ (47 + 53) points in the matches for the national team. Zhenya is puzzled with only one thing - that you still haven’t liked this post. # DreamsRussiapic.twitter.com / EljTlbCXPO

On the total dominance of the Russian team in the second period, resulting not only at the expense of 6: 1, but also in 20 shots at Markstrom goal (that is, the “red car” could easily throw a couple more times, finally finishing off the demoralized opponent she was just a bit unlucky), the Swedes were able to respond only with Patrick Hornqvist’s disciplinary penalty. The most experienced 32-year-old hockey player, who twice won the Stanley Cup as part of the Pittsburgh Penguins and speaking at the fifth world championship in his professional career, decided to talk to the arbitrators serving the meeting in high tones, and therefore met the siren for a break not on the ice, but in the dressing room .

In the final dvadtsatiminutke rivals played open hockey without regard to the account. The Swedes understood perfectly well that they could no longer avoid a defeat in the reporting meeting, and therefore they simply rode for their own pleasure — well, without striving to start a scuffle in any pause and cause injuries to one of the rivals. And the Russian team allowed herself to slow down and not be too zealous in defense.

Therefore, of the four goals that the audience saw in the third period, three were behind Vasilevsky. That, however, did not help the “third line” to revive at least the specter of intrigue. Is that the forward William Nyulander, who threw himself and assisted defender John Klingberg, regained his sole leadership in the bombing race of the world championship. Before the start of the playoffs, his assets appear to be 17 points (five goals and 12 assists), which is two more than Kucherov and Czech Yakub Voracek.

Highlights: @russiahockey win 7-4 win over @Trekronorse to end the prelim round unbeaten at #IIHFWorlds

More game highlights> https://t.co/LZ0SQWyVuEpic.twitter.com/Ffdcwt4APm

The match itself, the success in which brought the winning streak of Vorobiev’s wards at the 2019 World Cup to seven matches, ended with a score of 7: 4 - moreover, all seven goals in the “red car” were thrown by various hockey players (in addition to the attackers listed above, they added their sniper score defender Dmitry Orlov).

To prepare for the quarterfinal confrontation with the Americans, which will be held on the nearest Thursday, May 23, and will begin at 17:15 Moscow time, the national hockey players will be in a great mood. What can not be said about the Swedes: in the first round of the playoffs they will have to fight with far less stellar, but no less unpleasant neighbors from Finland, and one of the Scandinavian national teams will definitely not get to the medal fights.