from Martin Merk of the IIHF website,

Prior to the medal games of the 2022 IIHF World Junior Championship in Edmonton, IIHF President Luc Tardif and Henrik Bach Nielsen, IIHF Regional Vice-President and Chairman of the 2022 IIHF World Junior Championship Directorate, met the accredited media to sum up the tournament and have an outlook to the new season.

“Last time we had a press conference, we had to communicate the difficult decision to cancel the World Juniors because we had too many COVID cases. But we said at that time that the kids and the organizing committee deserved to have a way to play it at a later date. It’s a busy hockey calendar and we found August as the only time to play it and the most important thing is to have organized and to finish this tournament. We promised and we did it,” Luc Tardif started the press conference.

“We’ll have had 28 games here in one arena. It worked very well, there were no major issues. The demand to organize it at this level is high and they did a hell of a job,” said Henrik Bach Nielsen. “Injuries have never been lower than this year. We had no Covid cases. In our mind we think Covid is over but in many sporting events it still comes up like last month at the Tour de France. We stuck to the protocol and had zero cases.”

Having the World Juniors rescheduled in August was a different experience but also one the IIHF hopes not to repeat.

“We are happy with the quality and involvement of the teams, for which it was not so easy to come here. We knew that August is not the best time. We didn’t expect the attendance that we usually have. It was an experience and we won’t do it again unless we have to for some reason,” said Luc Tardif. “I want to look forward rather than backward. What is important is that the ticket sale is going well for Halifax and Moncton.”

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