Team Czech Republic beats Latvia in a high-scoring affair

Team Latvia had nothing to worry about in this game as they already secured their position in the top division in Thursday´s game against Denmark. The Czechs took adavantage of this fact and managed to gain a 7-4 win to stay in top division as well.

The game started with obvious motivation to win on both sides. The first goal of the game came 9:11 into the first period when Matej Zadrazil managed to put the puck above Elvis Merzlikins´s pad on a shorthanded breakaway.

Just 44 seconds later the score was tied thanks to Rudolfs Kalvitis, whose slap shot from the blueline went into Patrik Polivka´s net on a Latvian power play.

10:23 into the period, the Czechs took the lead again. Martin Prochazka made it 2-1 after he pushed the puck between the Latvian goalkeeper´s pads from close range.

Team Czech Republic was dominant in the second period as well. Two goals in the first 80 seconds by Jakub Vrana and Vojtech Tomecek gave the host team a 4-1 lead.

The Latvians were not giving up that easily, though. They called a time-out to regroup, and then 5:42 into the period Nikolas Jelisejevs cut the lead to two.

By the end of the middle frame, however, Team Czech Republic had increased its lead to four, as Jakub Vrana and Dominik Simon managed to put the puck behind the Latvian goalie.

The third period started better for Latvians. 2:04 into the period, Roberts Lipsbergs scored on a five-on-three power play and five minutes later Edgars Kulda managed to get another to make it 6-4.

The chance for Team Latvia to take some points in this game finally disappeared 68 seconds to go in the final period when Dominik Simon scored his second of the game, completing the scoring.

“We scored a lot of goals tonight and we finally started to capitalize of our chances,” said Vrana, explaining the main reason for the win.

Martin Lavrovs was not very satisfied with the Latvian performance: “We didn´t play very well, especially in the second period. We let several goals in and that decided about the winner of this game.”