Rhod and Anna's World Adventure

The sports watched around the world are steadily being ticked off. Aussie rules, rugby league, rugby union and baseball have all been covered and now we can put a big tick in the Ice Hockey box! We arrived in Montreal yesterday and noticed a steady stream of 'Habs' fans (the nickname for the Montreal Canadiens, though why I have no idea) heading for the Bell Centre. So we dumped our bags in our room, put on the biggest jumpers we could find as that seems to be a spectator requirement and followed them in the hope of getting last minute seats. We succeeded and not only were they last minute but they were in the last row too! At least we were pretty certain that no puck-related injuries would occur, which is fortunate as I'm not sure our holiday insurance would cover medical expenses caused by ice hockey pucks.

Now the sport we have seen so far on our trip has not really compared to premiership football in my opinion. Ice hockey however is the first sport that I can place in the same league. It was fantastic! We had no idea what the rules were when we sat down but we soon picked it up. You are pretty much allowed to barge into anyone and fight with them but tripping them up with your stick is a real no no and results in 2 mins in the sin-bin. Obviously we didn't fit in because we only had the one pack of crisps each, not the full on hotdog, nachos, fries and bucket of coke. You can actually buy a ticket for these items at the ticket office saving you a massive $2 off the extortionately over-priced combo.

The game consists of 3 periods of 20 minutes but as the clock stops when play stops each period ends up taking about 35 minutes each. Each team is only allowed 5 players plus the goalie on the ice at any one time but every 2 minutes or so whilst the game is still in play the team changes players so efficiently (sometimes all 5 outfield players at once!) that you hardly notice.

The Canadians love their hockey. Nearly 22,000 people showed up last night to watch the pre-season friendly game against the Toronto Maple Leafs. Tickets for the main games of the season have been on sale a while and all that are left are single seats in an arena that probably takes 24,000 at max capacity.

Sadly for the Montreal Canadiens fans both new and old that game did not end as they wanted. Toronto won 4-3 despite the Canadiens playing the last 8 seconds without a goal tender in order to have 6 outfield players on the ice. Hoefully we can catch some more games in the next few months.