26th August
EFC Qualification East starts in Valmiera, Latvia
The EuroFloorball Cup Qualification group East will start today. Within the next five days the 10 participating teams will battle for the spots in the EuroFloorball Cup Final Round.
The EFCQ East will be played in Valmiera, Latvia. The arena for almost all matches is Koceni, but one match on Sunday will be played in Vidzemes Olimpskais centrs.
There are five men´s teams in the men´s tournament. All teams are playing in the same group and the winner of the group will be qualified to the EFC Final Round.
The highest ranked men´s teams before the tournament are Russian Nizhegorodets, Slovakian SK 1. FBC Trencin and Estonian Jögeva SK Tähe.
There was supposed to be six teams in the women´s tournament, but due to withdrawal of Georgian SC Colegi Batumi, the tournament will be played with five teams. The playing system is same as in men´s category, all teams are in one group and the winner of the group is qualified to the EFC Final Round. The highest ranked teams before the tournament are Latvian Rubene, Polish Energa Olimpia Osowa Gdansk and Estonian Jäneda SHN.
During the first day of the tournament there will two women´s and two men´s matches played. The tournament will be opened with women´s match between Estonian Jäneda SHN and Slovakian FBC Dragons Ruzinov. The complete match schedule, on-line match records and statistics can be found from IFF EFCQ East web page.
Intensive matches on the first day in EFCQ East
Four matches were played in the first day of EFCQ East. The day was started with two women´s matches and in the evening the arena was given to the men´s teams.
The first women´s match was between Estonian Jäneda SHN and Slovakian FBC Dragons Ruzinov. The Slovakian team controlled the match in the beginning and took the lead twice, but in the the third period the match turned to Jäneda.
The end of the match was really exciting as Dragons Ruzinov had the chance to tie match in a penalty shot on the last minute, but Liina Lööper in the Jäneda´s goal stopped the attempt. Therefore Jäneda won the match with score 5-4.
In the match between Energa Olimpia Osowa Gdansk and Phoenix Fireball SE, Phoenix started better but as the match advanced the physical Polish team took more and more control and won the match 10-3.
Both of the men´s matches were really intensive matches. There were lot of speed in the game and this created thrilling situations for the both teams. In the first match Hungarian SZPK-Nokia had surprising 1-0 lead after the first period against Estonian Jögeva SK Tähe. This was changed in the second period when the Estonian team took control of the match. The skillful Pavel Semenov (3+3) was the architecht in the 9-2 victory.
The last match was real entertainment to the noisy 200 spectators. In the first period Russian team Nizhegorodets scored four times and it looked like the Slovakian SK 1. FBC Trencin would be underdog in the match. However, in the second period the Slovakian team improved their game a lot and started to get more and more pressure to the Russian goal. In the middle of the third period Michal Magdolen really exploided the audience by scoring the 5-5 equalizer to FBC Trencin.
Three minutes before the end FBC Trencin got a penalty and Nizhegorodets had the chance to take the lead in the power play. Evgeny Yudin used this opportunity and right after the power play goal he scored again so the score was 7-5 to Nizhegorodets. In the end FBC Trencin was able to reduce the lead only once and therefore Nizhegorodets took the victory with result 7-6.
27th August
Lots of goals on the second day in EFCQ East
The second day in EFCQ East brought two new teams to the tournament as the home team Rubene in women´s category and Georgian SC Locomotive Kutaisi in men´s category played their first matches.
The first women´s match was tight, but the three following matches ended with big goal differences. The atmosphere in the arena continued to be good, totally there were over 500 spectators during the day.
Phoenix Fireball – Jäneda SHN SE 4-5
The first match of the day was divided to two phases. Estonian team Jäneda SHN had the control of the match first 50 minutes and had the lead 5-1. In the last ten minutes the Hungarian Phoenix Fireball created great fighting spirit and increased the lead three times. This was however not enough and Jäneda took their second one goal victory in the tournament. The most effective players were Brigitta Radácsi (3+1) from Phoenix and Maret Must (1+2) from Jäneda.
Locomotive Kutaisi – Nizhegorodets 3-20
Men´s tournament continued with match between Georgian Locomotive Kutaisi and Russian Nizhegorodets. The more skillful Russian team dominated the match from the beginning to the end. Man of the match was Ilya Nikolaev who produced points 4+4.
Energa Olimpia Osowa Gdansk – Rubene 1-9
In the first period the Polish team Osowa Gdansk fought really hard and as the Latvian Rubene had some troubles to get their game going, the numbers were kept even. The Polish goalkeeper Katarzyna Postawka made some big saves and kept her team in the match. However, in the second period Rubenes´ first line started to produce goals and the match was decided. Zeltite Bankava (5+1) and Edite Bankava (3+1) scored goals in turns as Evita Rudzite was a real passing machine with points 1+7.
SK 1. FBC Trencin – SZPK-Nokia 10-4
Also the last match of the day entertained the noisy audience with lots of goals. In the first period the Slovakian team SK 1. FBC Trencin took the 3-1 lead, but in the second period the Hungarian team SZPK-Nokia evened the score to 3-3. After the equalizer the Slovakians improved their game again and made the needed goals for the victory. The Slovakians had wide range of scorers as the 10 goals were scored by eight different players.
After the second tournament day Estonian Jäneda SHN is leading the women´s tournament and Russian Nizhegorodets the men´s tournament. Both teams had collected four points from two matches. However, the second placed teams Rubene (women) and Jögeva SK Tähe (men) have played only one match.
28th August
Third day played in EFCQ East
After the third tournament day in EFCQ East the qualifying teams are still open. The winner of men´s and women´s tournaments will be qualified to the EFC Final Round.
Team Nizhegorodets have collected 6 points from three matches and is leading the men´s tournament. Also Jögeva SK Tähe has won their both matches, but they have played one match less. An important match on Saturday evening will be a match between NIzhegorodets and Jögeva.
In the women´s tournament there are three teams that have collected 4 points after three days. Olimpia Osowa Gdansk, Rubene and Jäneda SHN are all on the top of the group with same amount of points. On Saturday the match between Gdansk and Jäneda will be important in the battle for the first place.
Friday´s matches:
Energy Olimpia Osowa Gdansk – FBC Dragons Ruzinov 7-6
The tight match was settled only in the last minutes, when Karolina Littwin passed Adrianna Kwiecinska open goal and she was able to score the decisive goal.
Jögeva SK Tähe – Locomotive Kutaisi 24-0
There was no question about the winner, Jögeva SK Tähe dominated the match from beginning to the end. The most effective scorer was Siim Höim who scored seven goals.
Rubene – Phoenix Fireball SE 9-1
The same way as yesterday, Rubene had some troubles in the first period to get their game rolling. The Hungarian team Phoenix Fireball defended with disclipine and they were able to keep Rubene players in the corners. However, as the match advanced, Rubene started to get the shots to the target and in the end the home team took easy victory. Photos of the match can be found from the organizers web page.
Nizhegorodets – SZPK-Nokia 11-1
The evening match between SZPK-Nokia and Nizhegorodets was settled in the first period when with the lead of Evgeny Yudin (2+4) the Russian team took 4-0 lead. The Hungarians fought well, but the more skillful Russians were able to take home the victory.
29th August
The competition of EFC Final Round spots getting tighter in EFCQ East
The Saturday´s matches in EFCQ East gave some advantage to certain teams in the battle for the EFC Final Round spots.
The biggest winners of Saturday were Rubene in the women´s side and Jögeva SK Tähe in the men´s side.
Rubene has now won all their three matches and even a tie from the last match against Jäneda SHN will take the home team to EFC Final Round.
Also Jäneda has still a change to qualify to Final Round, but they will need a victory with 7 goals from Rubene tomorrow.
On the men´s category Jögeva SK Tähe took a very important victory today as they won Nizhegorodets 4-2 in an intensive match. This result means that the men´s Final Round spot will be settled tomorrow in a match between Jögeva and Slovakian SK 1. FBC Trencin. If FBC Trencin will win Jögeva with two or more goals, they will advance to Final Round. Otherwise the Final Round spot will go to Jögeva SK Tähe.
Saturday´s matches:
Locomotive Kutaisi – SK 1. FBC Trencin 0-24
The Slovakian SK 1. FBC Trencin took an easy victory in the morning as they beated Georgian team Locomotive Kutaisi with 24 goals. The Georgian team played with only six players which resulted in tiredness and more skillful Slovakians moved the ball too fast for them. The man of the match was Branislav Mitucha who scored totally nine goals.
Jäneda SHN – Energy Olimpia Osowa Gdansk 0-4
The match between Estonian Jäneda SHN and Polish Osowa Gdansk was settled allready in the first minutes. Jäneda got 5 minute penalty on the second minute and during that Gdansk scored twice. That was too much for the Estonians and when Gdansk goalkeeper Katarzyna Tolysz was able to hold her net clean, the Polish team took 4-0 victory.
FBC Dragons Ruzinov – Rubene 1-13
The home team Rubene took their third clear victory, this time defeating Slovakian team FBC Dragons Ruzinov 13-1. Once again the first period was a bit sticky for the Latvian team and even though they had 17 shots on goal, they were able to score only two goals. However, as the match advanced, the shots started to find their way to the net and the final result was clear victory for Rubene. The most effective player was Edite Bankava, who collected points 4+5.
Jögeva SK Tähe – Nizhegorodets 4-2
The most interesting match of the day was in the evening when Estonian Jögeva SK Tähe and Russian Nizhegorodets met. Both teams needed the victory to stay in the battle for Final Round spot. The match was really intensive and the level of the game was best in this tournament. The first period Jögeva pressed hard, but despite the good situations, they were not able to score. On the second period Evgeny Yudin took the lead to Nizhegorodets. This lasted only for few minutes, the equalizer was seen after nice passing play from duo Valery Maslov – Pavel Semenov. The match was settled in the third period when Alari Pagi scored his second goal of the evening and took Estonian team to 4-1 lead. Nizhegorodets reduced the lead once, but with the support from over 300-headed audience Jögeva SK Tähe was able to handle the pressure in the end and took an important victory.
