Honorary President of the International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF) Rene Fasel spoke about the scandalous match between the women’s teams of Russia and Canada at the 2022 Olympic Games.
– You can’t play hockey with masks on. Of course, this was a special situation. I hope this will serve as a lesson in the future. Canada is much stronger than Russia in women’s hockey, and the question of Russia’s victory was not in this match. There will be very important matches soon, and we must not allow athletes to play in masks, this is impossible. You can’t even run normally while wearing a mask, but how can you play hockey in them?
I am a doctor, really, I am a dentist, but I understand that the mask limits access to oxygen. It is clear that now a special situation due to the coronavirus around. But I can’t imagine that hockey players will agree to play in masks, it’s impossible. This is dangerous to health. I can’t imagine how, for example, to go in for speed skating in a mask. When you look at how much air the athletes need during the competition, then at these moments the mask is not serious for them, Fasel told Match TV.
The meeting on Monday ended with a score of 6:1 in favor of Canada. The start of the match was delayed by more than an hour due to the refusal of the Canadians to start the meeting without information about the tests of the Russians for the coronavirus. Later, Match TV learned that the IIHF had unilaterally changed the rules for taking tests for coronavirus.
According to the IOC playbook, hockey players must take COVID-19 tests twice a day, and for matches that take place in the morning Beijing time, tests taken the previous evening are used. At the initiative of the IIHF, Russian women were refused to be allowed to the match, demanding new tests from them, which were passed in the early morning of the same day. The team did not have them. As a result, the hockey players of both teams took to the ice in medical masks under their helmets. The Russians spent two periods in medical masks, the Canadian team spent the entire match.
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Source: news.sportbox.ru