Hokej

As some of you will know I’m a bit of fan of ice hockey. It started back in the dim and distant past that was the mid-90s in, of all places, Paisley. Then a team sprung up in Ayr and I was hooked. The that team folded in 2002 and eight lean years followed before a club was formed to play out of Braehead Arena on the edge of Glasgow. I went along from the start and soon considered myself to be a fan of the Braehead Clan, a club which just last summer changed its name to Glasgow Clan. Whilst most of my hockey viewing (as a fan you quickly drop the word ‘ice’) takes place at Braehead Arena, I do like to take the opportunity to watch games in other countries. Not that it happens much, I’ve been to a handful of games in the USA, I also followed the Ayr Scottish Eagles to Litvinov in the Czech Republic twenty years ago and Rouen in France just before the club folded. I saw Braehead in Sweden a few years ago. Just a couple of years ago I was in Prague and got to a game in the Czech second tier of hockey which was a great experience as Czechia is a major hockey nation. Recently I had the opportunity to see a game in the USA and no less than three more games in Czechia. This meant missing several Clan games so would it be worth it? 

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Prior to my recent trip to Texas I discovered that there was a game to watch whilst in San Antonio. The local club, San Antonio Rampage were playing the Rockford Ice Hogs in the American Hockey League. The AHL is a level below the top professional league, the NHL. This meant reasonably inexpensive tickets, one of which was procured for the game. The wrong game as it turned out, being the silly sod I am I had bought myself a ticket for Rampage Vs Ice Hogs on the following Tuesday. Much swapping of emails with Ticketbastard, sorry, Ticketmaster and I got it changed to the Saturday I was there and duly pitched up to the ticket office at the AT&T Center to collect it. After a bit of a discussion I was issued with a ticket for a completely different seat to the one I’d originally booked but hey, I was in the building so what the hell. The arena is huge, much bigger than I was expecting. I had no idea that San Antonio was as big as it is. So big in fact that it hosts a major league basketball club, the Spurs. Basketball is a big deal in the USA, much bigger than hockey. It dominated the sports channels on the TV and the Spurs have several NBA titles to their name. The AT&T Center has a capacity of 18,500 and will sell out for a Spurs game. The cheapest Spurs ticket is $139 plus fees for a seat in the gods. To get one next to the action you will pay $2300. Plus fees. To park your car in the endless parking lots will cost you an extra $20. Just as well, then, that I don’t like basketball. Tickets for the Rampage range from $14 to $57,  parking was $8 and you get to see hockey, not basketball. It’s all a bit of a no brainer. My replacement ticket took me to a seat that wasn’t very good as it was in the front row. Some people like rinkside seats but this one was behind the player’s bench. I moved back a few rows to a vacant seat at the end of the first period. It still wasn’t great but at least I could see the hockey, not the back of the players’ heads.

The hockey was of a good quality and the game a close one. The home team won 2-1, deservedly so, and most people went home happy. The crowd was announced as just over 8000 which is a pretty good turnout. I’ve been to NHL games with far fewer spectators. The game presentation was professionally done with the big scoreboard instructing people to make some noise, showing the occasional ‘kiss cam’ and also, as this was a ‘hockey fights cancer’ special, showing appropriate bits of video in support of the cause. Like Braehead/Glasgow, they have a bovine mascot though I must add here that ‘T-Bone’ is not a patch on ‘Clangus’. The atmosphere was a bit sterile though. When Clan score a goal I jump out if my seat, shout something akin to ‘yeahhhhhhh!!!!’ and generally wave my arms around like a deranged gibbon, as do most of the Clan support. When the Rampage scored it seemed to take a few seconds for it to sink in. A loud klaxon blared, a few fans got excited, the rest just smiled. I’ve found this before with sport in the USA. Unless it is at the business end of the season people treat a game as an evening out, not a religion. It takes nothing away from the game but just a little away from the overall experience. I’d enjoyed the game though and was glad I made the effort. I wish the Rampage well, especially as their coach, Drew Bannister was Clan’s player coach in the 2011-12 season. 

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A week or so after the game in San Antonio I found myself in Czechia (this name was formally adopted in 2016 but is only slowly catching on). Accompanying me was a friend of mine, David. He was the chap who introduced me to hockey at Paisley all those years ago. We had decided to go and experience euro-hockey and felt a good place to start was this central European country which takes its hockey very seriously. It helped that it was a relatively cheap destination and easy to get to and so it was that we found ourselves in the town of Pardubice, about an hour east of Prague on the train. Once checked in to our hotel we hot footed it to the neighbouring town of Hradec Kralove to watch their local team, Mountfield HK (not the most Czech of names, it was something to do with a sponsor) take on Litvinov in the Czech Extraliga. This is the top level of hockey in the country and the standard is high. It was a little less physical than the hockey I’d seen in San Antonio or indeed at home but the skill level more than made up for it. The game was another close one with the home side prevailing once more, registering a 3-2 victory. The overall experience was rather different though. The CPP Arena in Hradec Kralove was built in 1957 and has a capacity of 7,700. Over 5,000 were there that evening and whilst most were sat in the seats that surround three sides of the rink, a good number were standing on the terrace at one end. Whilst this may seem a little archaic it was the place where the noisiest fans congregated. They barely stopped chanting throughout the entire game and the place was full of what can only be described as atmosphere. I’ve no idea what they were chanting of course though I thought I heard the words ‘Hradec Kralove’ a few times. ‘Mountfield’ never got an utterance. It seems civic pride outweighs love of the sponsor. Our seats, which cost about six pounds each, had a restricted view so we ended up standing too, though at the back of the seated section rather than the terrace. Mulled wine, beer and a large variety of sausages were available to purchase in the concourse for not many Crowns and it felt to me that this was exactly how professional hockey should happen. The fans celebrated goals and the victory as though the apocalypse had been averted. Real fans. 

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The following day we went back to Prague. Our original plan was to stay in Pardubice where the local team were due to play on the Sunday but unfortunately that game got rearranged to the Tuesday by which time we had gone home. Instead, we decided to go and see Sparta Prague on the Sunday afternoon so billeted ourselves in the Czech capital for two nights. On the Saturday evening we discovered a game in the Prague regional league, in effect the fourth tier of hockey in that country. We found the rink in a residential area of the city and with a little bit of trepidation stepped inside. What we discovered was grass roots hockey taking place. A junior game was just finishing, there was a hockey shop doing some decent trade, a bar and a cafe and a rink that was there for playing rather than spectating. Eventually we discovered that there was no charge to go in and watch. The home side was Hvezda Praha who within a minute of the second period starting were 7-1. They didn’t run away with it though, their other two goals in a 9-3 win coming towards the end. It was quite enjoyable watching this level of hockey. There were only a handful of people there to watch and the players obviously play for the love of the game. It was also perishingly cold as befitting of a sport played on ice.

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Sunday’s game, an afternoon face off, was quite a contrast. The O2 Arena in Prague holds 17,500 people. Over 10,000 0f those seats, including our two centre ice seats that cost about a tenner each, were full for Sparta Praha Vs Ocelari Trinec. Trinec is a small town on the Polish border a couple of hundred miles east of Prague who play their home games in a 5,000 seat arena. There would have been something of Goliath Vs David in this encounter were it not for the fact that Trinec are punching well above their weight in the Extraliga and were sat on top of the standings with Sparta five places below. The big arena experience was similar to that in San Antonio made much better by the overall atmosphere. The presentation on the big scoreboard was professionally done and kept the fans involved during the breaks in play. There were dancing girls and a mascot who interacted with the fans. The arena concourse had all the appropriate food and other concessions which were being well patronised, much the same as the AT&T Center, if somewhat cheaper. The quality if the hockey was similar too. The big difference was that the crowd were well and truly into it. Whilst there was no terracing in the arena, fans behind the goal stood anyway and as in Hradec Kralove a couple of nights before, sang and chanted throughout the game. Unfortunately for them, in the end they didn’t have a great deal to cheer about. The teams traded goals early on but the score remained 1-1 until a few minutes from the end when the visitors, who had looked the more assured team, scored a powerplay goal. They added an empty netter in the dying seconds to complete a 3-1 victory which, whilst fully deserved, sucked the atmosphere right out of the place. Most home fans streamed out of the arena before the handshake, hurt. This is as it should be of course. 

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Four games of hockey, three home wins, two countries, one man’s view: if some higher being informed me that I had to watch hockey for the rest of my days in either the USA or Czechia, I would most certainly plump for the latter. Whilst the quality of the hockey on offer in the games I saw was similar, the USA could offer NHL which would be the ultimate but I’d happily trade that for the enthusiasm of the Czech supporters and the atmosphere they bring to their rinks. Discounting the amateur game, should that higher being then tell me to choose between Mountfield and Sparta as my favoured club I suspect I’d go for the former. Whilst the hockey watching experience was great in both locations, I favoured the older, harder edged arena in Hradec Kralove with the smell of sausage permeating the cold air. I would definitely have to have a better seat than the one I’d got though. Of course any higher being couldn’t really give a toss and I will continue supporting Glasgow Clan. I will, however, take more time out from the familiar surroundings of Braehead Arena to experience how others enjoy their hockey. Sweden or Germany anyone?