Defeated by the Swedes, Latvian hockey players reach the semi-finals of the world championship for the first time. The brightest moments / Article

The debutant Dans Ločmelis, Miks Indrašis and Jānis Jaks scored for Latvia, but Riharda Bukarts was recognized as the best player in the winning team.
Vote for your best hockey player in the Latvian national team in the game against Sweden

Latvian hockey players secured the decisive advantage in the last third, scoring two goals.

Dan Lochmelis reveals the result

Lochmelis opened the score in the middle of the first third, cleverly getting the puck in front of the goal.

Timotejs Liljegrens restored the tie in the second period, but the Latvian team proved that they are not only masterful hockey players, but also unbreakable fighters.

Miks Indrašis restores Latvia’s one-goal lead

Indrašis put Latvia in the lead again in the last third, sending the puck into the goal of Lars Juhansons unhindered in a quick attack.

Jānis Jaks scores the third goal

Six minutes before the end of the match, Jaks scored a safer victory for Latvians. Juhansons did not control the puck and pushed it into the goal himself.

The Swedish national team is the most frequent opponent of the Latvian hockey players in the world championships, the two teams have previously met 17 times. In none of these battles did Latvia manage to win in regular time.

In the first quarter-final in Riga, the Germans beat Switzerland, who were dreaming of gold medals (3:1), while in Tampere the USA hockey players entered the semi-finals with a victory over the Czech Republic (3:0).

Episodes of the Canada-Finland game

At the end of the day, the Finnish home team lost to the Canadian team (1:4).

The semi-final pairs will be determined by the place of the four strongest teams in the group tournament ranking, so it was already clear that the American hockey players will be the next opponents of the Americans.

For the first time in the world championships at the elite level, the Latvian national team has already won six victories in a row – after failures at the start of the tournament against Canada and Slovakia, the Latvians won all the following games in the group against the Czech Republic, Norway, Slovenia, Kazakhstan, Switzerland and now Sweden in the quarter-finals.

The World Championship will take place in Riga and the Finnish city of Tampere, where the semi-finals will take place on Saturday, May 27, and the medal winners will be announced a day later in the finals. Latvia’s national team match against Canada will start at 14.20

Vote for the best hockey player in the Latvian national team in the game against Sweden