The Latvian U18 hockey team led by Oleg Sorokin has avoided the game for remaining in the top group in the elite group of the World Championship (WC) in the Finnish city of Espoo. Latvia will play Canada in the quarter-finals in the city of Vantaa on Thursday at 7:45 p.m.
At the stage of the group tournament, the young hockey players of Latvia took a step towards entering the quarter-finals after a 5:3 victory over Slovakia, but in the last game they suffered a painful loss to Norway with 3:5 and had to live in a nervous waiting mode for the next twenty hours. In order to enter the quarter-finals, the loss of the Norwegian point to the Slovaks or the victory of Slovakia with a difference of two or more goals were suitable. Already in the second minute of the game, Slovakia was in the lead with 2:0, and after the first period – with 5:1. It was obvious that the Norwegians had spent a lot of energy in the game with Latvia, so the final result was a crushing victory for Slovakia with 11:1. At the end of the group stage, three teams each had three points. The division of places took into account the goal difference in the matches between each other, after which Slovakia took third place in subgroup A (14:6), Latvia took fourth place (8:8) and Norway took fifth place (6:14).
The opponents of the quarter-finals, the Canadians, in subgroup B did not leave any hope for the competitors – 6:3 against Sweden, 6:0 against the Czech Republic, 8:1 against Switzerland and 11:3 against Kazakhstan. The Latvian U18 national team lost to the second North American team USA in the group tournament without reservation with 1:7. The Canadians will be clear favorites in the quarterfinals, however, anything can happen in one game.
On Thursday, Norway and Kazakhstan will try to stay in the U18 hockey elite
