Canada’s Hockey team looked set to go into the Gold medal game going into the third period of tonight’s semi-final against Slovakia and even the crowd were chanting “We want the U.S.A.” But then the Slovaks woke up and decided to throw caution to the wind and try make a game of it, perhaps it was hearing the “We want the U.S.A.” chats from a set of fans who were considering this game over, but whatever it was they suddenly started peppering the Canadian goal. With less than ten minutes to go they scored one making it 3-1, with less than five minutes to go it was 3-2 and rather than show the savvy experience that runs deep through their line-up the superstar loaded Canadian team hit the panic button. Slovakia poured on the pressure and in the dying five seconds seen one of their star players, Pavol Demitra, miss an open net that would have forced the game into overtime. Instead the clocked ticked down and the cheers that filled the arena were cheers of relief rather than celebration.

Make no mistake about it, Canada will have to pick it up against the very impressive American team that remains undefeated so far in the tournament. It wasn’t that Canada were bad tonight, in fact through the first two periods they played pretty well and just that this game came off the back of that wonder performance against the Russian’s, does this one seem shaky. But the game lasts 60 minutes and Canada should have had to ability and knowhow to see it out.

Slovakia played the perfect North American game of tight checking, shutdown Hockey and even after falling behind they stuck to their game plan, stopping the result from getting out of hand and hanging close enough to try get back into the game.

Clearly Canada when they played Russia were pumped up for the game because of the rivalry and because they wanted to prove a point. The players were intense, they were hyped up and they put on a clinic. Tonight I feel they kind of expected to beat Slovakia and while no player would ever admit that, I think they almost took them for granted, especially after two periods. Sunday’s final against the Americans is likely to be more like the Russian game than the Slovak game in terms of the build up, the hype and the ambition of the Canadian players to get some revenge on the U.S.A. for last Sunday’s defeat. Of course the U.S.A. will be better coached than that Russia team, they are a team playing better Hockey so while you can expect to see Canada come out hard, fast and physical in front of a deafening crowd, you can also expect the Americans to put up a fight in reply.

Canada have squeaked through here tonight when it should have been a breeze, but it doesn’t matter how you go through in the end – they are there now and Sunday’s final shapes up to be an absolute classic and a replay of the 2002 final in Salt Lake.

Read more about: Olympic Hockey, Team Canada, Team Slovakia, Team USA, Vancouver 2010 | ALL SUBJECTS |

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