High-scoring start to pre-season

The first action of the 2023 pre-season produced plenty of action as Avangard took on its farm club Omskiye Krylya in a warm-up game in Omsk.

Avangard Omsk 6 Omskiye Krylya 5 SO (1-0, 2-1, 2-3, 0-0, 1-0)

The teams entertained a 5,000-strong crowd with 10 goals. And the VHL outfit recovered from 1-4 and 3-5 to tie the scores in regulation. However, Avangard secured the verdict in a shoot-out.

Hawks head coach Mikhail Kravets was not too concerned with his players’ struggles against lower-level opposition, pointing out that at this stage of the summer, it’s all about the process.
“First, this team is still preparing,” he said. “Second, right now we’re in a part of our cycle where we’re loading the guys [with physical work], they’re playing with a heavy load. The pluses were good skating, winning our battles, having more puck possession, scoring five goals and playing a strong center ice game. The bad news was the third period: allowing two goals in a few seconds, easing off like we’ve seen before.”

The leading player for Avangard was Igor Martynov, who scored the first two goals and added an assist in the third.

“I scored a double for Magnitka last season, but with no assists that time,” Martynov said. “We’re working, we’re growing. Today there was a chance for a hat-trick but it didn’t quite happen.
“Avangard wants to play fast, aggressive hockey, that’s what our coaches are expecting. It all starts from the first shift, because the coaches put the emphasis on discipline but we took a lot of penalties. In the end, that led to them tying the game. Kravets told us that we need to play a full 60 minutes and not get off our gameplan.”

Avangard did not ice a full-strength team. Vasily Demchenko, Damir Sharipzyanov, Libor Sulak, Valentin Pyanov and Ivan Telegin were among the leaders who missed Thursday’s game. Several youngsters got a chance to impress on the first team. Dmitry Sokolov, Gleb Trikozov, Dmitry Solovyov and Mikhail Gulyayev all contributed assists.