In just a couple of days, the Champions Cup 2020 will be played in Ostrava, Czech Republic. It is, in fact, the most prestigious floorball tournament on club-level and gathers four of the best teams in the world.
I promise that when you have finished reading this guide, you will know everything there is to know about the 4 teams that will be playing for the most prestigious club prize in the world of floorball. And it will also make watching the games much more fun 😉 I will do this by answering the most important questions, in-depth. Enjoy!
If you are in a hurry, you can jump directly to the question you want to see answered. After reading the answers to all the questions, you will have in-depth knowledge about all the teams and their current form, which players to look for, etc.
Table of contents
- What is the Champions Cup?
- Which teams will be participating?
- What are the biggest changes for each team?
- What is the current form of the teams?
- Which players to watch?
- Who will win the Champions Cup 2020?
In this article, I will offer you a thorough look at the teams so you will have all the background information behind the matches which will be played on Saturday 11 (semifinals) and Sunday 12 January (bronze and gold finals).
But let’s first start with the basics, what is the Champions Cup?
What is the Champions Cup?
The Champions Cup is an official annual floorball event for clubs hosted by the International Floorball Federation and I will let them explain what the tournament is exactly:
“The IFF Floorball Champions Cup is a tournament for the elite European clubs organised by the International Floorball Federation (IFF). […] Currently, the tournament is played in January each year as a Final Four event with 4 teams for both men and women (8 teams in total).
Currently, the four teams involved, for both the men´s & women´s competition, are the national club champions of Czech Republic, Finland, Sweden & Switzerland. The winner of the Champions Cup, in both men’s & women’s categories, receives prize money of 10,000 CHF and the runner-up receives 5,000 CHF.”
Source: IFF
An added bonus of having the IFF as the organizer is that the matches are streamed on their Youtube channel and can be watched for free around the globe.
Which teams will be participating?
For reasons I will explain later in the article, this Champions Cup edition is filled with an intense rivalry, rich history and is likely the tightest and most exciting edition so far. But before I will lay out why the match-ups are so exciting, let’s introduce our guests of honor.
Storvreta IBK (Sweden)
The reigning champion of Sweden is a recurring party to this floorball fest. With a long history and an impressive track record, the Uppsala-based team will try to set things straight after last year’s disappointing finals of which you can find the highlights here. The team qualified for the Champions Cup by defeating arch-rivals Falun with 6-3.
Classic (Finland)
The Finnish powerhouse Classic returns to the Champions Cup with the gold medal of last edition hanging proudly on their necks. The team holds many Finnish national team players and has their home stadium in Tampere. The team qualified for the Champions Cup by defeating TPS in a best-of-7 series which granted them the Finnish gold medal (and some obnoxiously kooky white hats).
SV Wiler-Ersigen (Switzerland)
Wiler-Ersigen became Swiss champions on 27 April 2019 by defeating Grasshopper Zurich in a surprising one-sided finals.
[penci_blockquote style=”style-2″ align=”none” author=”” font_style=”italic”]”Matthias Hofbauer — Can you believe this legend is 38 years old and still playing in Swiss highest league? No, not just still playing but actually LEADING his team in the number of points scored?”[/penci_blockquote]
Vitkovice (Czech Republic)
Vitkovice is the host club of the Champions Cup 2020 and will bring a big army of spectators as a back-up. The team earned their spot by defeating Mlada Boleslav in an exhilarating final with 4-3 on 14 April 2019.
What are the biggest changes for each team?
Let’s start with Storvreta, the Swedish masters who set aside arch-rivals Falun in the SSL finals last season. The core of the team has stayed very much the same with two lines that deliver time-and-time again. However, there have been a couple of setbacks for the team.The biggest problem the team is facing at the moment happened a couple of weeks ago when the club laid off head coach Andreas Harnesk. Although the team can thrive on experience alone in the SSL, the Champions Cup is another class of floorball which may expose weaknesses which wouldn’t happen with Harnesk in charge (more about current form below). Furthermore, Alexander Rudd (sick) and Mattias Samuelsson (light concussion) are still question marks in this weekend’s line-up.
Classic, the current titleholder, let go of a number of incredible players during the transfer season (how this affected them you’ll read below when I discuss current form). However, in May[ppp_non_patron_only]As much as we love floorball, we dedicate a lot of time and money to the FloorballToday project (more info here). That's why we ask you for a small monthly donation. By clicking the button below you can become one of our supporters and read the rest of the article. Thanks a lot! Already a patron? Then here is where you can login. [/ppp_non_patron_only][ppp_patron_only level="6" silent="no"][ppp_patron_only level=”6″ silent=”no”] the club announced the signing of Ville Lastikka, a young player but with tons of international experience (he made an important assist in the WFC2018 finals against Sweden). And it seems he found his place with the current reigning champions, netting one ball after another. Impressively, he currently ranks as the #2 point scorer of the Salibandyliiga, behind fellow teammate Sami Johansson.
Wiler-Ersigen has their eyes set on winning the Champions Cup, that’s for sure, and they have all the rights to. With the transfer of Finnish floorball superstars Krister Savonen – who was voted world’s best field player in 2019 – and Joonas Pylsy – tournament MVP of WFC2018 – the team contracted two of the hottest players in the world. The fact that they took the players from semifinals opponent Classic will add a spicy flavor to the pot.
Then Vitkovice. There had been some speculation in Czech media about head coach Pavel Brus leaving the team to become the head coach of the men Czech Republic team but the speculation was smothered by the end of December which means the team is set to make a good result. Apart from that, the team has known very few changes and has stayed more or less the same since they lifted the trophy in April last year.
Which players to look out for?
Storvreta
Alexander Rudd — Probably the most unpredictable player in the world right now and incredibly fun to watch. Has incredible synergy with the player that will come next. However, he is still a question mark for this weekend.
Robin Nilsberth — One of the world’s best defenders. Combines his physical defending style with powerful slap and drag shots. Always a threat!
Albin Sjögren — Entered Storvreta’s A-team as a big talent a couple of years ago and he delivered. Won the point league two seasons ago and is doing very well this season, too.
Classic
Sami Johansson — Probably the best sniper in the world at the moment. With 64 points after 18 games (of which 45 goals), the Finnish forward is bound to make at least some goals this weekend.
Ville Lastikka — What a season for the young and bulky forward who combines physical prowess with incredible technique. Definitely a player to watch in this Champions Cup.
Wiler-Ersigen
Mattias Hofbauer — Can you believe this legend is 38 years old and still playing in Swiss highest league? No, not just still playing but actually LEADING his team in the number of points scored (26 points out of 11 games)?
Krister Savonen — The best field player in the world now plays for Wiler-Ersigen. The agile has stick handling most of us can only dream of.
Michal Dudovic — The Slovakian talent climbed the ranks within Wiler-Ersigen for which he started in the U19 team but now is a sure pick. A mid-season knee injury threw a spanner in the works but the sniper “should” make his appearance during the Champions Cup, he confirmed with me..
Vitkovice
Tomas Sladky — Brings a ton of experience to the field due to his many years playing for the Czech National team. Still plays a crucial role in the team.
Lukas Soucek — The goalkeeper of Czech Republic’s national team is detrimental to the success of Vitkovice. They are lucky to have him.
Adam Delong — Adam Delong played an excellent WFC2018 and can be regarded as Czech Republic’s finest.
What is the current form of the teams?
With a second place in the Swedish SSL, Storvreta can’t be entirely disappointed with their season so far. The competition, as always, is fierce, not only from arch-enemy Falun but also from the other teams. With around 2/3 of the competition already played, the Red Eagles have seen the gap with Falun increase to 7 points but should be happy with having the best defense in the league.
To assess form, what I do is only take the last 10 games of this season and see what the standing would look like:
We can see the team is not in their best form with only 21 points from 10 games, including two losses (against Falun and Dalen) and two draws. However, with a big recent win under their belt (11-1 against Jönköping) and a massive comeback against Linköping, the team is probably not too worried:
The epitome of good form is probably Classic, who still have to concede a single point in the Finnish league. That’s right, the team holds a perfect score of 54 points after 18 games played. One can argue that the Finnish Salibanyliiga is actually quite a competitive league if you take Classic out of the equation but leave them in and you immediately see how much they are ahead:
Classic is definitely in superb form and most likely already pretty confident since they are the reigning champions.
Wiler-Ersigen will be Classic’s opponent in the semifinals but what is the form of the current Swiss champions? First, let’s take a look at the standings to see how they’re holding up compared to the other Swiss NLA teams:
With quite an impressive goal difference we see Wiler-Ersigen on first place, closely followed by Grasshopper Zurich. The team dropped a couple of points here but with a goal ratio of 126:53, which gives the team both the best offense and defense in the league, the team can probably be considered favorites for another Swiss championship.
However, when we look at the form in the last 5 games, the team seems to be struggling a bit:
With 10 out of 15 points the team is not having their best period. With two won ties against Köniz (6-5) and Tigers (8-7) and a loss against rivals Grasshopper Zurich (3-6), the team is not navigating in waters as clear as they would like.
Vitkovice is not having a bad time in the Czech Superliga having already qualified for the playoffs (look at the arrow up sign below:)
It’s clear that no team can measure up to Mlada Boleslav this (regular) season and with some room in between we find the pack of Vitkovice, Chodov and Sparta Praha. It has been everything but a steady season and the team endured some turbulence along the way, especially near the start of the season:
The team shows an excellent form including a recent December win against rivals Chodov. The reason Vitkovice lags behind Mlada Boleslav is a quite horrendous October month in which the team lost against Black Angels (5-6) and Mlada Boleslav (3-6) and drew versus Ceska Lipa (8-7), Otrokovice (4-5) and Sparta (4-5). The most recent loss is still fresh but not entirely surprising as it was against Mlada Boleslav, the team that stands out among the rest.
Who will win the Champions Cup 2020?
It is, of course, impossible to announce a winner before the tournament has even started but we can, of course, make an attempt. In general making a prediction is very hard and specifically this year the tournament could go to every team. Czech teams historically struggle when they face Swedish/Finnish/Swiss teams but this may very well be counteracted by the simple fact that Vitkovice will play in their own city which will make every game incredibly interesting, potentially.
The most likely scenario will be a rehearsal of last year’s finals when Classic battled Storvreta. Storvreta has a couple of question marks and can be in better form (head coach fired, unsure if Alexander Rudd and Mattias Samuelsson play) than they are now but the team possesses so much quality, that they SHOULD make it to the finals and shed off Vitkovice.
The same goes for Classic although it’s very hard to say what will happen on Saturday when they face Wiler-Ersigen. Classic is probably the best team in the world right now but with two of their old players playing for Wiler and Michal Dudovic hopefully back on the field, it won’t surprise me if they can grab the tickets to the finals.
The finals … will be a fantastic game, regardless of which two teams will stand there on Sunday. Will it be Storvreta, looking for revenge after last year’s lost finals? Or will it be Vitkovice, with a packed arena in their back? Will the team play against Classic, hungry for renewing their Champions Cup trophy or Wiler-Ersigen, who arguably have their best line-up in many years – a perfect storm?
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