Some European Captains Plan to Wear Rainbow Armbands at World Cup in Poland – And Not a Laughing Matter
The World Cup of Hockey, the annual tournament between the European nations, is currently underway over in Europe. After an interesting competition in Sweden, when a fan-inspired protest was held against the Russians, a country that is widely known for its anti-gay policies, the tournament continued here in Poland. Some of the nations are very popular, like the Czech Republic, Sweden, Australia and the Czech Republic. The rest of the teams are pretty much unknown apart from a few countries like Russia and Finland.
One of the two teams that have just qualified is Poland. They came second in the preliminary round, which is the last round of the tournament. They qualified from the group play and now they are in a group of four teams that were not qualified for the tournament. The Czech Republic and Sweden are in the other groups and the only team in the group that is from outside Europe. That is kind of weird to be honest.
But the two teams that are playing in the European tournament are the Czechs and the Swedes. The Czechs are the defending champions and they are in group B. Sweden are group A, the team with the most points. The Czechs and the Swedes are the second and third placed teams in the group, which is a pretty good result.
At the start, it looked like each team was going to go undefeated and win the European tournament. They both had the same goal, which was obviously to beat the other team that was in the group. There was no reason to do anything else, because it is a matter of pride for both teams.
The result is not much different from the first round. The Czechs defeated the Czech Republic in a close game, while Sweden knocked off the Netherlands. Both teams could have beaten the Czechs or the Netherlands, but they took the chance and did just that by winning every single game of this tournament.
And now the situation looks somewhat different. Both teams have different plans. The Czechs are not too keen on wearing a rainbow armband in their jerseys, although there were some fans wearing them. They decided not to wear the rainbow