Looking ahead to..

the 2006 IIHF World Championships in Riga, Latvia

Group A
Czech Republic
Finland
Latvia
Slovenia

Group B
Sweden
Switzerland
Ukraine
Italy

Group C
Slovakia
Russia
Belarus
Kazakhstan

Group D
Canada
United States
Denmark
Norway


This is the one tournament Ukrainians can expect a decent outcome out of their National team. Ukraine has always had some trouble against the Swede's, Switzerland are tough to beat but they have been beaten before, and the Italians.. well i'm not sure what the Italians bring to the table.

The C group is though IMO.

Atleast its full of Slovan countries :) (Im not sure about Kazakhstan though being a Slovan country).

It will be interesting to see how teams like Kazakhstan and Italy do in the Olympics..

Kazakhstan could do fine but I dont know how they will fair if the game is called with NHL rules (the harder rules).

Italy, well, they should lose everything. I expect them to be feisty though and could fight a bit.

Group C is certainly the hardest if you ask me. All four teams made it to the qualifying round in Austria. Belarus beat Kazakhstan then, but it was close and there is not too much between the teams. I hope Belarus can do it again... :)

I think there are 7-8 teams who have chanches to win. After Torino there wont be many NHL-errs and that is why some team can suprise us. Latvia can play very good tournament ( home advantage ). Canada may not dominate because the NHL playoffs and i wonder that how many Canadiens know where latvia situates. So I think Chech, Slovakia, Finland, canada, USA, Russia, Sweden have even chanches to win it and Latvia and Belarus can be in semi finals

This is an interesting situation, since this is an Olypmic year some players on the Olympic team may avoid the World Championships. However there will be other players battling for future Olympic and World Cup spots.