"We have 10 newcomers — they need to adjust to the current system"

The Gagarin Cup finalist Traktor Chelyabinsk lost a whole group of key hockey players in the offseason. First of all, we are talking about goalkeeper Zach Fukala, as well as forwards Maxim Shabanov and Vitaly Kravtsov, who left for the NHL. The Ural club spent the first month of the new season unstable. In ten matches, he scored five wins and suffered five defeats.

In an interview with Izvestia, Traktor's captain, striker Alexander Kadeikin, explained the reasons for such results, told how the newcomers adapt to the requirements of the team's head coach Benoit Groux, and also assessed the prospects of Shabanov and Kravtsov in the NHL.

— Traktor, on the one hand, did not show its best performance in the first month of the season, on the other hand, it is only four points behind the leaders. What is the mood in the team in this regard?

— Everyone is more in a working mood. We're probably learning more now, getting to know ourselves more, what we can do, what we can do, where we're successful, and where we need to fix something. I wish there would be more episodes with points scored and we would pull up more and more.

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— What should I look for myself after the Gagarin Cup final and considering that the head coach has been working at Traktor for several seasons?

— We still have 10 new people in the team. You have to understand that the head coach is a man with his own vision of hockey, with his own structure of the game. Some of the guys who came to Traktor this year didn't play that kind of game. They are trying to understand the demands of the Gru, to understand them. It's one thing to just tell the coach that everything is clear. Another thing is to do it shift by shift, at every moment. This is also a restructuring. For some, it causes withdrawal due to a departure from the usual game. From his game. Here we have more demands to play for the team. And this rebuilding process is not yet painless.

— You mentioned 10 new hockey players in the team. In the summer, it seemed that Zak Fukale, Maxim Shabanov and Vitaly Kravtsov would be the most significant losses for Traktor. Who else does the club miss from the departed players?

— Yes, all of them. Everyone contributed to the success of last season. If you start listing everyone by name, it will take a long time. Take Nikita Korostelev, who played great against us for Spartak in the last match. And I've had a great start to this season. Buddy Robinson was the man with his role in Traktor, the soul of the band. Tema Blazhievsky and Stephen Kaempfer are two key defenders. Volodya Tkachev was our captain last season. A lot of people, in general. Even if we take only those whom we have listed, these are the guys from Traktor's top 9 last season. This niche was now vacant — new people had filled it. If the old guys understood the requirements of the Gru, then the new guys need to adapt again. It was even easier for us a year ago, when Benoit first took over Traktor. It was easier for us to adapt to his requirements with the whole team and learn from him than it is now, when 10 people thoroughly know what the coach wants, and 10 more have just arrived, and they need to adjust to the existing system. It's always hard. We try to help the guys, but it's still not easy for newbies. At the same time, even in such conditions, Josh Livo is among the top three scorers in the KHL. That is, the process is underway. Someone adapts faster, someone is slower, but there is a positive.

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— Can we say that Traktor is under pressure from the syndrome of high expectations, since many people expect a repeat of the results of last season, not taking into account the personnel changes you are talking about?

— No, well, that's right, they expect this from us. We expect it from ourselves. We have a good team, good players. Yes, a new story has begun compared to last season, but we still know the bar that we set ourselves. We try to reach for it. But it's not working as fast as it did a year ago.

— Do you believe that Shabanov and Kravtsov will be able to gain a foothold in the NHL in the upcoming season?

— I think so. One has a good chance, the other has a good chance. We're watching, we're watching — we want the guys to succeed. Besides the fact that they are good hockey players, they are also good guys in terms of human qualities. And as a human being, I want them to succeed. In my understanding, both should successfully enter the NHL. The main thing is not to let any unexpected factors play a role. As you know, a hockey player's career is quite unpredictable. And sometimes such ridiculous things play a role that you don't even know about them. That's why I want the guys to avoid this.