Ritten – Cortina: The game of all or nothing

All or nothing, heaven or hell – the outcome of the seventh meeting between Ritten and Cortina has far-reaching consequences. Only one team is allowed to continue their season in the Serie A playoffs, the other has to withdraw from the competition. A favorite cannot be identified before the last meeting. Ritten has the home advantage in his favor, but Saturday's disappointing performance is still weighing on his spirits. “The performance was shocking,” said Ritten President Thomas Rottensteiner, “we went to work without passion or grit. But that's a thing of the past. Already on Tuesday we will present ourselves completely differently and work with concentration. We certainly have to blame ourselves for helping Cortina find her way back into the series. But our opponent has an excellent team that is in top form at the right time. In the seventh game everything is open.”

There is great confidence in Cortina that they will ultimately reach the semi-finals, especially since the pressure, according to captain Giorgio De Bettin, is clearly on the shoulders of the South Tyroleans. “We can play completely freely. But don't get me wrong: now that we've come this far, we want to make it to the semi-finals. We will take our hearts into our hands and fight until we drop. Coach Clayton Beddoes has done an excellent job of getting everything out of the players so far, now it's up to us to crown the great performances of the past few weeks. In order to survive in Klobenstein, we have to be very compact and at the same time play aggressively forward. If we manage to keep up the pace, we can definitely pull off this important coup.”

In this series, in which both teams have celebrated three wins each, Cortina was significantly more dangerous in terms of goals (15:11 goals). The top scorer in the duel is Paul Albers with three goals, while Erik Weissmann and Stanislav Gron (6 points) lead the scorers. At Ritten, however, Chris Durno (3 goals, 2 assists) has stood out so far. However, it is shocking to look at the balance sheet of the “special teams”. Here Cortina and Ritten have a balance of 3,3% (1 out of 27) and 9,6% (3 out of 31) respectively.

The match in the Ritten Arena will be led by the main referees Luca Cassol and Karel Metelka, as well as their assistants Luca Zatta and Claus Unterweger. Ritten will miss striker Matteo Rasom due to injury, while Cortina will be without Andrea Baldo. He suffered a shoulder injury in game six. The game can be followed live on Radio NBC frequencies.

Serie A – 7th quarter-final match (best of seven) – Tuesday, March 5, 2013

Arena Ritten in Klobenstein, 20:30 p.m Ritten Sport Renault Trucks – Hafro Cortina Standings in the best-of-seven series: 3:3 (3:0, 2:1, 2:3 aet, 1:4, 3:1, 1:5) Referees: Luca Cassol, Karel Metelka, Claus Unterweger, Luca Zatta

Serie A – Playoff semi-finals (best of seven) – 7th, 9th, 12th, 14th, 16th, 19th, 21st March 2013)

Winner Ritten Renault Trucks/Hafro Cortina – Valpellice Bodino Engineering Fiat Professional Wolves – Migross Supermercati Asiago

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Ritten – Cortina: The game of all or nothing

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