Published: 15 May, 2009, 19:31
Edited: 18 February, 2010, 04:08
The Continental Hockey League (KHL) will become equal to their American contemporary the NHL in the next five years, says hockey legend and KHL CEO Vyacheslav Fetisov, Sport-Express newspaper reports.
The KHL officials have officially closed the 2008/09 season, giving a press-conference on Friday.
“I congratulate all of you on the successful conclusion of the KHL season. Everything we were talking about in the past seven years has now become a reality. You all see interest among fans which the league attracted from the very start of the season and the impact that caused by the final series,” Vyacheslav Fetisov said.
“When people do their job from the heart, the result is great. If we continue this way then within five years we will be able to compete with the National Hockey League. We are ready to catch up with Americans as to the quality of the game, and the level of the games organization. But there is, of course, a lot of work ahead of us,” he added.
And league president Aleksandr Medvedev said the KHL has already started to contribute to the development of hockey worldwide. He congratulated the Russian national team on winning the Hockey World Championships last week and pointed out that 78 players from the league took part in the tournament in Switzerland, and all of them managed to at least reach the quarterfinals.
“We were able to implement the principle: ‘strong clubs – a strong national team’. The basis of the Russian squad that won in Bern consisted of the players from the KHL. The synthesis of the players from the Russian league and the NHL – this is what we have dreamed of for many years,” Aleksandr Medvedev said.
Around four million people saw the KHL season’s matches, with an average game attendance of 7,300 people.
Many foreign broadcasting firms are willing to show KHL matches to their audiences. One of them is Swedish Viasat, operating in Nordic and Baltic Sates, who just signed a three-year contract with the league.
The KHL is planning to expand into Western Europe. Medvedev said that negotiations will be held with five Swedish clubs – Färjestad, Frölunda, HV-71, Djurgården and Linkoeping – who are willing to challenge the best teams of Russia and CIS.
The league now consists of 24 clubs – 21 of them are Russian and three more represent the former Soviet states of Belarus, Latvia and Kazakhstan.
The KHL has finished its first season, but it is already considered to be the strongest league in European hockey. It was created as a Russian answer to the NHL.