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The Champions Hockey League was a short lived ice hockey league which was launched in 2008–09 by the International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF). Its creation coincided with the IIHF's 100th anniversary.[1] The league included the best teams in European ice hockey. The financial reward for progressing to the CHL Group Stage was a portion of the 16.9 million Swiss francs that is distributed evenly between the teams with a 1,000,000 Swiss francs[2] bonus going to the winner; the largest monetary reward ever given in any European ice hockey competition.[1] The Champions Hockey League replaced the IIHF European Champions Cup,[3] the former competition for Europe's top ice hockey teams. The Silver Stone Trophy, which has been awarded to the top club team in European hockey since 1997, was the CHL's championship trophy.[1]
[edit] CancellationThe IIHF announced on June 15, 2009 the cancellation of the Champions Hockey League 2009–10 season, to possibly resume in 2010–11, with the possible contribution of the NHL.[4] The continuation of the league was already called into question in January when the main sponsor, Gazprom, as well as Reebok, pulled out of their commitments to sponsor the league for three seasons.[5] Conflict with the NHL also arose, whereby the European sponsors led by Gazprom were willing to fund 50-60% of the league and control, whereas the NHL offered to fund up to 60%, but wanted full control of the league's operations. Some teams were considering legal actions against IIHF for the cancellation of the CHL, because "the clubs have blocked out game dates and CHL participation in their budget-planning consideration", as Gernot Tripcke, the general manager of the German DEL said. On 21 October 2009, the IIHF announced an agreement with Hockey Europe to re-launch the CHL in 2010–11 with teams from the 7 top European leagues. Included in the agreement is a settlement that compensates the clubs that qualified for the cancelled 2009–10 edition.[6] [edit] Format The first qualification round will consist of 18 European national club champions who were ranked 7-24 on the IIHF's European club ranking list. These 18 teams will be split into 6 groups of 3 clubs. The 6 winners will advance to the second qualification round where they will face the runners up (the teams that didn't win the championship of their respective league) of the top-6 rated leagues in a two-legged match, meaning they will be decided on aggregate or the total score of two games. The winners of the second qualification round will advance to the next round (called the CHL group stage) where they will be included with the champions of the top-6 rated European leagues. The teams in round one will then be split-up into four groups of three where they will all compete in a double round-robin-type series. The winners from each of the four groups will advance to the semi-final where they will play again on aggregate in one home and one away game. The winners of the semi-finals will play each other in the finals where they will, once again, play on aggregate. The winner of the final will win the 1,000,000 Swiss franc bonus and the CHL competition. 2008 IIHF League Ranking[7]:
[edit] Seasons[edit] List of Champions Hockey League finals
[edit] 2008–09 SeasonMain article: 2008–09 Champions Hockey League Because of the limited preparation time, the first edition was played with only 12 teams from the top seven leagues in Europe. The four top leagues (Russia, Czech Republic, Sweden and Finland) are represented with two teams each. The leagues ranked 5-7 (Slovakia, Switzerland and Germany) are represented with one team. A second team from Switzerland (SC Bern), qualified for the main stage by winning a qualifying tournament which was held in September.[8] The final was won by the ZSC Lions from Switzerland, beating Russian team Metallurg Magnitogorsk. [edit] 2009–10 SeasonMain article: 2009–10 Champions Hockey League Before the cancellation the second season of the Champions Hockey League was going to be expanded to two qualification stages with a total of 29 teams from 22 different countries participating. The main phase, however, was still going to be contested by 12 teams, among them the 7 champions of the top leagues which are directly qualified for the groups stage.[9] [edit] 2010–11 SeasonIn October 2009, the IIHF an Hockey Europe agreed on the relaunch of the CHL in 2010. Details about format in participating teams will be announced at a later point.[6] [edit] Victoria CupMain article: Victoria Cup Every year, the Champions Hockey League winner and one team from the National Hockey League will play for the IIHF-run Victoria Cup.[3] The criteria by which the NHL/IIHF will select the teams to go to the Victoria Cup has not yet been released.[10] The winner of the Victoria Cup will receive 1,000,000 Swiss francs. [edit] BroadcastingThe CHL was broadcast across Europe on various national TV networks, as well as on the Internet. [edit] References
[edit] External links
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