Preview against Belarus

Head coach Gergely Majoross and his coaching staff made some changes to the lineup. The first line stayed the same with Bartalis and Gergő Nagy changing places. Bartalis on the second line and Nagy playing on the third line. In the fourth line line Krisztián Nagy took the place of István Terbócs with Terbócs being the 13th forward. On defence Bence Szirányi is out with an injury, the defencemen are staying the same except for Varga take the place of Szirányi next to Kevin Wehrs. In net Ádám Vay will get the start with Bence Bálizs serving as the backup.

Belarus won their opening game of the tournament as they flipped the score against Lithuania as they were down by two goals and won 4- in the end. From the team that Hungary took on in December there are eight players that dressed in the opening game of the World Championships. The last time Hungary took on Belarus at a World Championships was at the A-Pool in 2016, which Hungary took by the score of 5-2. There are 16 players that have played in the KHL with Geoff Platt playing 46 games in the NHL. The former Soviet country still plays in more of a North American style after having a Canadian head coach for five years and now having Andrei Sidorenko. Sidorenko was born in Russia, during his career he had been the head coach for the Belarusian national team as well as the Polish national team. He has coached club teams in Belarus, Poland and Russia during his career, teams such as Spartak Moscow and Dinamo Minsk.

Gergely Majoross, head coach: Both teams are through a similar game, looking at their first game, I think they made similar tragic mistakes as we did and also got similar goals scored against, however they did find a way to win and we did not. We are expecting a different game today, we will not be able to possess the puck as much and the shot difference will not be the same. We also saw that hockey is not about this but making the right decisions and controlling the situations, which we did not do and was the reason for the this. I do not think we can not take anything away from the two games we played against them earlier in the year. The team we faced in Bled is not even close to this one, the one in Norway was a bit closer but the squad they have here is a lot stronger. We have played against Belarus at World Championships with not much success, we are here to go against the rankings. In today’s hockey world there are not distinct types of hockey, the Belarusian team is an example of this since they do not play in the classic Russian style. Everyone is trying to pick up bits and pieces from here and there which results in a mix that works or does not. This team is aggressive in a lot of areas which is more of a North American style, however they are very technical which is what the Russian style was known for.

Line verse Belarus
Erdély, Hári, Galló
Bartalis., Sarauer, Sofron
Nagy G., Vas, Bodó
Nagy K., Benk, Magosi
Terbócs

Stipsicz, Szabó
Varga, Wehrs
Pozsgai, Macaulay

Vay (Bálizs)
Injured: Szirányi

Roster

Staff