Given the article in Aftonbladet.se regarding Boork's remarks about Göteborg as a hockey town, I was curious to see if there is "another side" to this story.
I can see his point about Göteborg being a soccer and team handball town by tradition. However, if people come out for Frölunda, it seems a bit harsh to shoot down the people working with hockey in Göteborg, as well as the city's hockey culture, even if the locals have limited interest in other teams.
Now, I could have misunderstood this, or the reporter could have written this story to create a tabloid, as well as Boork's job these days is to create tabloids, or maybe he is still bitter?
Given the article in Aftonbladet.se regarding Boork's remarks about Göteborg as a hockey town, I was curious to see if there is "another side" to this story.
I can see his point about Göteborg being a soccer and team handball town by tradition. However, if people come out for Frölunda, it seems a bit harsh to shoot down the people working with hockey in Göteborg, as well as the city's hockey culture, even if the locals have limited interest in other teams.
Now, I could have misunderstood this, or the reporter could have written this story to create a tabloid, as well as Boork's job these days is to create tabloids, or maybe he is still bitter?
What are your thoughts?
I guess it depends on what you compare with. Compared to Linköping or HV71, Frölunda has great history and there is absolutley an interest for hockey but I would lie if I dident claim that Gothenburg first and fore most is a football (soccer) town.
I think Boork saw a chance of getting his name in the paper again and went for it. It seems like a non issue to me.
I thought Frölunda has had the highest attendance in Elitserien for years? Surely there's hockey interest there.
Nobody should pay any attention to Boork. Trolls don't go away if you keep giving them attention. Trolling is the only weapon Boork has left now in his twilight years, his understanding and knowledge of hockey hasn't developed since 1985 or something like that.
To say that Frölunda's junior program only resulted in Lundqvist, Kahnberg, and Tolsa is pure idiocy. And his arguments seem rather futile when he's not factually correct about the numbers.
In Gothenburg municipality, population 510,000, there are only eight rinks, including Scandinavium and Frölundaborg. This really affects kids who want to play hockey, I myself started playing when I was six, but already at that stage due to the shortage of available ice time you saw cuts being made. Basically making it impossible for new players to join teams since they obviously didn't "make the cut" from the start and thus were not prioritized and basically only sat on the bench during games until they gave up tried some other sport.
Gothenburg is a really big sports town, but hockey is an outsider within the sporting community. Much due to the fact that cutting players at that early age is considered blasphemous in other team sports. Finding and keeping talented kids within the sport will be tough when you have so many good teams in football, handball, floorball, and etc, who all cooperate with each other, which hockey don't. The only solution to a more genuine hockey culture I can see is to build many more rinks (two are currently being planned) and get an outreach program to other sports and schools.
Despite a lacking hockey culture Boork seams to like this city after all since he recently bought an apartment in Eriksberg. Maybe this article was a result of him not being recognized often enough at the local Coop Forum.
I doubt any other Swedish hockey team has had more future NHLers go through it's youth system the past 15-20 years than Frölunda.
And then there is the attendance...
Of course Göteborg is a football city first and foremost, you'd struggle to find any city with a total of 34 football championship titles that isn't, but to say that it doesn't have a hockey culture is complete garbage.
The football support in this city is traditionally split over class divides, and the people who actually go to games are usually the more die hard fans. Most people have been born into a club, but they don't really follow them very closely and only really go and watch if there is a big derby. Most casual football conversation has more to do with the stereotypes attached to the different fans, than with the actual football.
Unlike the football clubs, support for Frölunda actually unites most of the city, and the club attracts families to the games, something you can see in the attendances, which have been the highest in Sweden and in the top 5 in Europe for many, many years. If you start talking hockey at a place of work or at school, people will actually talk about hockey, instead of trying to find new and creative ways of calling each other "brats", homeless or gloryhunters.
In Gothenburg municipality, population 510,000, there are only eight rinks, including Scandinavium and Frölundaborg. This really affects kids who want to play hockey
I don't know how the situation is in Malmö, but this is pretty similar to Stockholm. I would guess that most of these rinks are at least a generation, if not two, old. That, in my opinion, and the price of equipment, are the biggest challenges for our sport in the coming decades.
I think that the Federation should start up some kind of enterprise set on achieving at least half of the rink densities of a normal bigger Canadian city in our 3 metro areas. Maybe recruit some old NHL players and let them play golf and "charity" games with key politicians and entrepreneurs, in order to sell the some what unsexy concept of using public money to actually build practice rinks, not arenas, for the local kids to use.
In Gothenburg municipality, population 510,000, there are only eight rinks, including Scandinavium and Frölundaborg.
That's a really low number, considering that a fairly new and much smaller hockey town like Linköping have five rinks (if we count the one they use in Ljungsbro... it's part of the municipal after all).
Don´t forget the Westerholm twins and the big Victor Mångs. Mångs has a good shot at being drafted if he has a good season. They also have the really promising Calle Andersson. Malmö could do very well in Superelit this season.
Don´t forget the Westerholm twins and the big Victor Mångs. Mångs has a good shot at being drafted if he has a good season. They also have the really promising Calle Andersson. Malmö could do very well in Superelit this season.
