Ice Hockey World Championships | Referee boss Jyri Rönn tells his opinion about the telling verdict of the Leijoni match

The lions marched in the World Cup in what many consider to be the wrong way, when Sweden got the upper hand in extra time of Thursday night’s match.

Sweden advanced to the semi-finals Joel Eriksson, too with a man-of-the-match goal, while Suomen Konsta Helenius sat in the ice box.

Helenius had been caught in a situation that led to a freeze, having tried to score Adrian Kempen behind and tried to interfere with his racket. The judge saw the situation as hooking.

The head referee of the SM league Jyri Rönn did not see that Helenius had acted wrongly. Rönn does not play any role in the WC tournament.

“In this situation, Helenius stays at the back and the Swede gets to the goal post. Helenius comes from behind and plays with the stick against the stick from under the lower hand, which is the only ice advantage option for him in the situation,” says Rönn.

“If he played with the stick into the hands, between the hands, or hooked from the body, it would be cool. That was a good game in my opinion, I wouldn’t have whistled for a cold one”, he continues.

An experienced judge can tell what the whistle that shook the Finns could have come from. Rönn points out that on the ice the situation comes up quickly and the decision has to be made immediately. The referee has no slowdowns.

In this situation, the referee who blew the whistle is on the other side of Helenius. The event remains a bit “masked” for him.

“The judge may then have a slightly weak line of sight to the situation. There is the danger that it may appear that the club is in hand. If you start to guess at all, it might be that there will be a bad call (judgement)”.

In extra time, the game changes, when we switch from tied fives to playing three against three. According to Rönni, the game situations are similar for the referee, but especially there are a lot of 1vs1 situations in the rink.

“It should be easier when there aren’t so many players on the field. However, every situation is highlighted, you have to be a hard-headed guy.”

In his own work, Rönn guides that certain decisions are made in the rink.

“In fast situations, we try to give instructions so that if you can’t see, don’t whistle. Don’t guess.”

The lions head coach Jukka Jalonen said in the hallway that Finland had played against an “NHL team and a couple of referees”. He stated that Finland had received light ice-outs in the match and said that he demanded the referee’s observer admit a mistake regarding Helenius’ ice-out.

Rönn does not think that the line of referees in the match was somehow exceptional. Finland received four two-minute penalties in the match, Sweden one.

“It would be easier to do an analysis on the spot, but I don’t see any big imbalance through TV. We can always talk about some borderline case solutions, they occur in all hockey games. I didn’t see it as a particularly linear performance,” says Rönn.