Sparta Suffer Crushing Home Defeat to Mladá Boleslav for the First Time in Five and a Half Years

Prague hockey club Sparta suffered a home defeat to Mladá Boleslav in a third-round match of the Czech Extraliga, played in front of more than 12,000 spectators at the O2 Arena. It was Boleslav's first win on Sparta's home ice since March 7, 2021 — exactly 2,025 days later, as visiting coach Petr Haken pointed out.

A disastrous first period

Sparta head coach Josef Augusta made no secret of his frustration after the game, saying the team had blown the first half of the match. "It was disheartening. We had no drive, the opponents were better and faster, and we kept playing around the edges the whole time. Just a very poor start," he admitted in an interview with Oneplay Sport.

Early in the second period, Mladá Boleslav went up 2:0, and the hosts then leveled the score — but just 17 seconds after Chlapík made it 2:2, the visitors regained the lead thanks to a goal from Lichtág. Sparta's summer signing Blümel restored parity with a goal in the 40th minute before the break, and it looked as though the hosts would carry a psychological edge into the third period.

A fatal mistake late in the game

The third period, however, once again belonged to the visitors. "Before the third period we said everything would come down to our defense and offense. Unfortunately, we made one mistake, our opponents scored, and we couldn't create anything meaningful of our own," Augusta said, admitting his team hadn't deserved to win.

"I believe in the hockey gods, and in the first half of the match we offended them, so we didn't deserve any luck in the second half. We were poor both defensively and offensively. The only positive is that we picked things up a bit afterward and had stretches where we played the way we want to. But that's nowhere near enough. You simply can't play like that at home," Sparta's coach summed up bluntly.

The hosts clearly outshot their opponents 41:23, yet Mladá Boleslav had just as many — if not more — genuinely dangerous scoring chances.

Visitors executed their game plan to perfection

Bruslaři coach Petr Haken put the win down to sharp tactics: "We had a plan for how we wanted to start, and in the first period we carried it out almost one hundred percent. The players took it on board and stuck to it in the third period as well. The guys pursued their goal and earned the victory."

"We tried to stay focused and compact. We wanted to be proactive rather than sit back. We managed to shift the momentum a few times and had several breakaway chances. And we held firm defensively," Haken said, listing the keys to success. With this win, Mladá Boleslav have collected five points from three games this season.

"Let's not say we were flawless or played a perfect game. Sparta have great strength, they put us under real pressure, but we managed to respond," the visiting coach noted.

Sparta weren't thrown off even by a forced goaltender change: after the second period, Vojtěch Mokrý left the ice with an injury, and his place was taken by Dominik Furch, who — despite not having warmed up — held his net and stopped all 14 shots the hosts threw at him. "We have two excellent goaltenders, and Dominik proved it. Mokrý also carried us through the first two periods. We'll see how he's doing — it looks like some sort of injury, but I haven't spoken with anyone about it yet," Haken added.

Around Prague, based on reporting by sport.cz