Hockey
The hockey player was beaten in front of his wife and children. The KHL has never seen such a carnage!
Players from both teams accumulated a record 840 minutes of penalty time.
Fights have always been considered an integral part of hockey, but the event that occurred in the KHL match on January 9, 2010 went beyond all reasonable limits. The regular championship meeting between Vityaz near Moscow and Avangard Omsk ended in a huge scandal, the likes of which domestic hockey has never seen before or since.
The showdown began during the rollout
“Vityaz” of the 2000s was a very specific team. The team brought together several strong North American fighters. They didn’t wield a stick very skillfully, but they waved their fists, be healthy. It was for fights and endless brawls that that team was “famous”. Not everyone liked the image of the “bad guys,” but the fans in Chekhov gathered in the stands, among other things, to see the fist show. At that time, Vityaz had a special relationship with Avangard, for which the legendary Jaromir Jagr and a number of other outstanding hockey players played.
Enmity between the clubs has existed for a long time, but the peak of the confrontation was 2010. At the end of the New Year holidays, Avangard went to visit Vityaz. Even during the pre-match warm-up, it was clear that there would be little hockey that evening. One of the main fighters of the hosts, Darcy Verot, deliberately bullied his opponents: the Canadian specially stood near the center of the ice and hit the Hawks players passing him with his stick. The guests tried not to give in to provocations, but when Vero threw the puck at goalkeeper Karri Ramo, who was doing stretching exercises, Avangard’s main tough guy Alexander Svitov could not stand it. The first, but not the last, fight that evening broke out between him and Vero.
— It’s difficult for an unprepared person to go into the ring with a boxer. It’s the same here. During training, people only smash punching bags, and go out on the ice only to learn how to stand on skates. Of course, I was not afraid of the Vityaz tough guys. Well, if I got punched in the face, so what? What’s wrong with that? — Svitov later recalled the era of confrontation with Canadian fighters.
Svitov and Vero were so separated that in the heat of the fight they found themselves naked to the waist. Vityaz director Vasily Klokov described the events during the warm-up, trying to make the visiting player the aggressor.
“Svitov stripped him to the waist, but he himself was left in only tights. They fought for about five minutes, and no one paid attention. The fans were still at the buffet. First they fought standing, then lying down: they hugged each other on the ice, crawled across the entire middle zone to the side of the Avangard, and there their strength left. Darcy’s wife sat in the box with the children all this time and saw everything from beginning to end. So the children were almost speechless! — Klokov said in an interview with Soviet Sport.
There was no longer any talk of normal rolling after this. Another Canadian from Vityaz, Brandon Sugden, tried to challenge the Avangard players to a fist fight before the match, but the visiting team’s hockey players did not want to take off their gloves.
Endless brawl
Before the opening face-off, both teams were pumped to the limit. For a powerful fire, all that was left was to bring a match. We didn’t have to wait long; the hockey in this match lasted less than four minutes. At the 3:27 mark, a fight in the five-on-five format began, the reason for which was Svitov’s forceful move against the hosts’ player. Sagden, whose fists were itching even from the skate, jumped out from the bench to stand up for his partner.
At the same moment, Vero and Jagr were on the ice: the Canadian, significantly inferior in height to his opponent, attacked the Czech giant and even managed to hit him in the face, but the star striker quickly “swaddled” the restless bully.
— If you are a tough guy, you must abide by the code of honor. People were waving around us. I held him. Vero told me: “That’s it, it’s hushed up. We won’t fight.” I let him go. And a couple of seconds later this guy got in my face. I didn’t expect the blow, so I fell. But that’s the kind of person he is,” Jagr noted on fresh tracks.
After the massive brawl, it took the judges about 15 minutes to sort out all the penalties. After a long pause, the game resumed, but only for a few seconds. Almost immediately after the throw-in, a new mix began in the four-on-four format. And again, the referees had to communicate for a long time with the referee’s table, issuing endless fines. “Vityaz” was not going to calm down; after the next throw-in, the home players again attacked their opponents. They were not embarrassed that at that moment the guests were in the minority. Dmitry Vlasenkov rushed onto the ice from the Avangard bench to help his teammates. After this, players from both teams followed his example, and the fight began in the “all against all” format.
An hour after the starting throw-in, only a few hockey players remained on both benches. The rest received match penalties. The last fight that evening broke out between the remaining players, after which it was no longer possible to continue the meeting. As a result, the judges handed out an incredible 840 minutes of penalties to the hockey players of both teams, which became an absolute record in the history of hockey.
The very next day, an emergency meeting was called at the KHL office about what happened. League leaders, along with representatives of both clubs, tried to understand how this could all happen and who is the main culprit. Avangard was sure that the massacre was planned by Vityaz.
— The Chekhov Club initiated a fight that disrupted the match. If this continues, Vityaz should be removed from the championship. Many people have expressed the idea that crime bosses have come to Chekhov for the match. And the fight, as they say, was ordered. Even before the match, I warned the KHL that a massacre was being prepared. I don’t know who, but it’s clear that they ordered the fight. It didn’t start spontaneously,” noted Avangard general manager Anatoly Bardin.
As a result, both clubs received a technical defeat and a large fine. “Vityaz” suffered much more financially – the club was ordered to pay a record fine of three million rubles. These measures did not have any particular impact on the Chekhov team. In the same year, Vityaz staged another massive brawl in a game with Avangard, this time in Omsk.
Source: Sportbox
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