World junior champions are players from the Czech Republic
The Czech Republic became the Junior World Champions for 2021. In the Men’s U19 WFC final, they defeated Finland 4-3 after a big turnaround and repeated their triumph from 2019. Although the Finns led for a long time, they eventually took silver from Brno, with Sweden taking bronze after a battle with Switzerland.

Alpo Laitila sent Finland into the lead in the 4th second of the game, and the same player then scored a goal to make it 2-0. But the Czechs started to tighten the gap and after goals by Matej Havlas, Matej Pěnička and Bohumil Piskáček they turned the score around. Tatu Havula then equalised for the Finns and the decisive goal was scored in the 59th minute by Czech forward Matěj Čermák.

Finland – Czech Republic 3:4 (2:0)(0:1)(1:3)

Goals: 1. Alpo Laitila, 18. Alpo Laitila, 55. Tatu Havula – 23. Matěj Havlas, 43. Matěj Pěnička, 51. Bohumil Piskáček, 59. Matěj Čermák. Referees: Simon Broman – Martin Matti. Penalties: 1:2. Powerplay goals: 1:1. Spectators: 2261. Saves: Juuso Jokisalo 13 – Tomáš Jurco 17.

Photo: Martin Flousek