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Afinogenov remembers the shutout of the Czechs

The Russians striked down the Japan team very easily and vindicated their advancement to the Qualifing Round.

 

Maxim Afinogenov scored the very first goal in that game. He is also the author of winning goal in the Quarter Final against the Czech team in the winter olympics in Salt Lake City. The Russians are going to play against Finland, Slovakie and the USA.

 

The game against Japan was kind of a practice for you..

Yes, it was good practice before other three games. These are going to be though. Everything will be much faster, there are going to be a lot of one-on-ones and we need to prepare properly. We don´t avait easy points.

 

Could you describe your goal?

I got the puck just right on my stick, I was kind of quick. I skated to the centre of the ice rink and just shut off. The puck passed the goalie´s pad.

 

How is your line with Bashkirov and Bucayev?

All Russian players are great. Bujayev and mainly Bashkirov are amazing players, great skaters. I am happy to play with them in one line.

 

And how you like the championship atmosphere?

It´s great. The games are visited by a huge amout of fans. There are a lot of Russian fans too. They support us very much. Everything is fine.

 

Don´t you mind the number of points the Russians gained?

We could do more points but we lost with Swedens so we have only two points. But we cannot do anything about that now. We have three games in the fron of us, so there is six points in the air. It will not be easy, it´s clear. There are many great teams. From my point of  view, there will be a small number of goals. The underbase will be in the defense. Each goal can decide the game.

 

Do you remember the game against the Czech Republic in Salt Lake City?

Yes, I do. We won 1:0. We played really hard and our goalie Chabibulin was fabolous. We scored the only goal and advanced.

 

Now it could happen again…

It´s too early to think about the Quarter Final now. We have three important games left. And only after then we can think about the Quarter Finals.

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