Record crowd sees Team Bobrov dominate the Skill Show

The 2023 Fonbet KHL All-Star Game set a new attendance record on Sunday. 20,384 fans came to the SKA Arena for day two of the event, marking an all-time high for a single-day turn-out. Added to Saturday’s crowd, the total was 40,066 spectators, comfortably the highest total since the move to a two-day format.

Those fans saw Team Bobrov storm to success in the skill show. After sweeping all three contests on Saturday, there were two more wins for the Western division on Sunday. First, SKA’s Vladimir Alistrov powered to the fastest lap in 14.115 seconds.

Then came the shoot-out contest. Vladimir Tkachyov paired up with Team Chernyshev assistant coach Dmitry Sychev, and the former football star joined in with a ball as well as a puck before the hockey player finished the move with a well-placed header. Vladimir Mikhalyov took Nikita Gusev’s spot and used the opportunity to repeat the Dynamo forward’s legendary 2015 spin-o-rama shot.

Vladimir Mikhalyov, Team Tarasov forward

I wasn’t expecting to take a shot, but before the show Nikita Gusev came to the locker room and said: “You’re up today, think of something!” I first I wanted to do something between the legs, but Nikita suggested it was time to hand over his move. I agreed with him, and gave it a go.

Previous penalty shot contests have seen coaches on the ice. Today, they stayed behind the bench, but Metallurg’s Nikita Grebyonkin paid tribute to Andrei Razin by recreating his coach’s trademark penalty shot, complete with the familiar bald head.

Nikita Grebyonkin, Team Kharlamov forward

We wanted to have some fun. It was [Metallurg captain] Yegor Yakovlev’s idea. I think the bald head was fun, a bit cheeky, maybe a bit aggressive! I don’t know if everyone got that it was tribute to Razin’s go-to move, but I’m sure that fans from Magnitogorsk would recognize it. He didn’t know about it himself, it was all a big secret.

The winner was Vasily Atanasov, who dressed up as a pineapple and attempted a tricky play scooping the puck between his own legs. The Torpedo forward also distributed pineapples as gifts among the other players. That impressed the crowd, and he got 36% of the votes to give Team Bobrov its fifth win in five contests.

The final contest was ‘Effective defense’, a chance for the goalies to shine as they faced a flurry of shots from selected forwards. At last, Team Bobrov was denied with Lada’s Vladislav Podyapolsky and his beanie-style helmet stopping all seven attempts to give Team Kharlamov the win.

Vladislav Podyapolsky, Team Kharlamov goalie

It’s a great arena, I really like it. It’s huge! If you look up, you can’t even see the people. In the contest, I just got lucky. The pucks came to me. But I’m happy that I won. Today we can relax a bit on the ice and enjoy ourselves.