Artyom Batrak: “The key aspect of the final is Ilya Nabokov’s performance”: News

KHL TV channel commentator Artyom Batrak analyzed the fourth match of the final series in his column on KHL.ru.

In general, everything was heading towards Magnitogorsk winning the final. This was more or less clear after the second match, when Magnitogorsk took a 2-0 lead in the series and created a serious advantage for themselves. But Lokomotiv did not give up. Yaroslavl went into the fourth game the way it should have gone out – this is exactly the kind of Lokomotiv many expected to see in every game of the final. In the first period, Lokomotiv was indeed much, much more dangerous, but, apparently, it was some kind of emotional charge against the backdrop of previous failures. Lokomotiv converted this danger into a goal.

Shot the puck Yaroslav Likhachev, and this is great – Yaroslav had a hard time in the playoffs, and in general the season turned out to be difficult for him. But he scored his goal in the final and it was absolutely on point – Lokomotiv began to bring the puck to the goal line more often and shoot from there. This allowed Yaroslavl to open an account.

But already in the second period we saw that Metallurg added more. Then Magnitogorsk acted, let’s say, in its standard, good and fast manner. Metallurg did not change anything at all, neither in the lineup nor in the game. It’s simply not possible for 60 minutes in the final, especially in the decisive match, for everything to turn out the same as it did before. Therefore, in the first period it almost didn’t work out, in the second “Metallurg” was able to improve a little, and then it went from there.

I’ve already talked about this, but I’ll note it again – we can say that Metallurg was not sent off in the final. That is, the team Andrey Razin basically deprived Lokomotiv of such an option as the majority. This became an important nuance of the final, victorious for Lokomotiv.

But the key aspect is the game Ilya Nabokov. Simply key. He should have won the title of MVP of the playoffs. The confidence with which he played was simply incredible.

Metallurg scored at the end of the second period. Lokomotiv spends the second periods well, but Metallurg deprived their opponent of this weapon in the final. The Urals abandoned the second one at the end and here, in my opinion, there was a weak request from Lokomotiv, which in the end did not bring anything good to the Yaroslavl team.

Well, in the third period, again, things didn’t change much. Lokomotiv fought, tried, but could not. And Metallurg scored another one, and, interestingly, they did it in the majority. Look there Daniil Vovchenko, Alexander Petunin, Igor Geraskin – those people that Andrei Razin brought from Severstal came and scored the winning goal for Metallurg in the final. Fantastic, simply fantastic.