Is Hockey
Went to my first ice hockey match the other day. It was great - a good match, and good atmosphere. It is a very quick game - every time I got distracted with just how good the skating was (I'm an average rollerblader full of envy) or how much behind the play biffo was occurring (and there was a lot), the puck would be down the other end of the ground.
There were lots of different chants by the crowd, some to well known tunes like the Hallelujah Chorus, Frere Jaques, and When the saints go marching in. My favourite chant was "hora på isen", sung to the tune of Guantanamera. It means "whore on the ice", and was directed to an opposition player who used to play for Luleå. Unfortunately, I was standing right behind a really, really loud but tone deaf person, and next to an only slightly tone deaf person, so it was really hard to know exactly where to pitch my own chanting.
The team is sponsored by the local steelworks SSAB, has a bear as a mascot, and the Luleå players entered from the bear's head to the thumpin' tune of acca dacca's T-N-T, with everyone shouting Lu-le-å. At one point it had fireworks coming out of its nose. Another Aussie touch was the opening handclapping bars of Whispering Jack at one point between periods.
The final score was a Luleå win, 3-2. Timrå were getting pretty desperate in the last stages and the game got pretty scrappy. Luleå is currently 5th on the ladder, and are widely expected to stay there. Interesting Swedish taxation laws mean that for 6 months they can give an 'artistic professional' scholarship to great overseas players without instead of a salary, which would involve overheads overheads like income tax etc that would be at least double the cost of the actual salary. So they save 2/3 of a normal salary, but the player cannot stay beyond 6 months, and the season is long (and there are 3 matches a week), so even if the star No. 25 can get them to the finals, he wont be there to help them win.
There were lots of different chants by the crowd, some to well known tunes like the Hallelujah Chorus, Frere Jaques, and When the saints go marching in. My favourite chant was "hora på isen", sung to the tune of Guantanamera. It means "whore on the ice", and was directed to an opposition player who used to play for Luleå. Unfortunately, I was standing right behind a really, really loud but tone deaf person, and next to an only slightly tone deaf person, so it was really hard to know exactly where to pitch my own chanting.
The team is sponsored by the local steelworks SSAB, has a bear as a mascot, and the Luleå players entered from the bear's head to the thumpin' tune of acca dacca's T-N-T, with everyone shouting Lu-le-å. At one point it had fireworks coming out of its nose. Another Aussie touch was the opening handclapping bars of Whispering Jack at one point between periods.
The final score was a Luleå win, 3-2. Timrå were getting pretty desperate in the last stages and the game got pretty scrappy. Luleå is currently 5th on the ladder, and are widely expected to stay there. Interesting Swedish taxation laws mean that for 6 months they can give an 'artistic professional' scholarship to great overseas players without instead of a salary, which would involve overheads overheads like income tax etc that would be at least double the cost of the actual salary. So they save 2/3 of a normal salary, but the player cannot stay beyond 6 months, and the season is long (and there are 3 matches a week), so even if the star No. 25 can get them to the finals, he wont be there to help them win.
posted by Mark Terner at
11:23 PM
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