Teams from ten countries on the start of the competition in Zakopane!

Teams from ten countries on the start of the competition in Zakopane!

18/01/2014 13:54

Today on HS 134 hill in Polish Zakopane will be held the first of two planned competitions - the team competition. We will see teams from ten countries composed of four athletes in each team. It's hard to point a favorite of this competition and the qualifications' results did not help with it - in the Top 8 were ski jumpers from eight different countries. The first team competition in this season in Kuusamo the victory took Slovenia ahead of Japan and Germany, but Japanese did not come to Zakopane. The Austrians, Germans and Slovenians are in a high, well shape. Also Norway can take a good position today, because as we could see in previous competitions Norwegians usually perform well as a team. As first we will see representation of Kazachstan: Alexey Korolev, Marat Zhaparov, Alexey Pchelintsev and Sabirzhan Muminov. In the team of Italy will perform: Roberto Dellasega, Andrea Morassi, Davide Bresadola and Sebastian Colloredo. The third in order is Russia, composed of: Anton Kalinitschenko, Mikhail Maksimochkin, Alexander Sardyko and Ilja Rosliakov. Fourth on start is representation of Czech Republic: Antonin Hajek, Roman Koudelka, Lukas Hlava and Jan Matura. Finland will be represented today by: Lauri Asikainen, Janne Happonen, Olli Muotka and Anssi Koivuranta.

In this group some names are quite surprising. In Russian team we will see Mikhail Maksimochkin, who yesterday shocked everyone with his amazing 130,5-meter result in the qualifications and today has a chance to prove that his last performance was not random. To the Czech team comes back Roman Koudelka, who from the beginnig of the season had a spinal pain, but now - as he says - everything looks good and he qualified to the individual competition with 24th result and we will see him also on the upcoming Olympic Games in Sochi. To the World Cup came back Janne Happonen, who after individual trainings in Finland and Germany seems to be in good shape. The last five teams will surely fight for the highest positions in the competition. Norway will jump in team composed of: Anders Fannemel, Daniel Andre Tande, Rune Velta and Anders Bardal. In the team of Slovenia will perform: Jurij Tepes, Robert Kranjec, Jernej Damjan and Peter Prevc. Poland will be represented by: Klemens Muranka, Dawid Kubacki, Jan Ziobro and Kamil Stoch. Representation of Germany will be composed of: Andreas Wank, Richard Freitag, Andreas Wellinger and Severin Freund and as the last we will see current leader of the Nations Cup - Austria in team composed of: Michael Hayboeck, Manuel Poppinger, Thomas Diethart and Gregor Schlierenzauer.

Lukasz Kruczek's decision, that beside Stoch and Ziobro in the team competition will perform Muranka and Kubacki is a bit shocking. People ask Polish head coach which game he plays, because so far it seemed that Maciej Kot and Piotr Zyla can be sure their places in team. Also Norwegian coach Alexander Stoeckl decided to resign from experienced Tom Hilde and replace him with young and talented Daniel Andre Tande, for who this will be his 4th World Cup competition in career. Tande debuted in the World Cup in Tauplitz/Bad Mitterndorf one week ago and surprised everyone with good results. The Austrian team is strong, but also very young - good result today will be a sign to all that the Austrians are favorites for the Olympic medal. Today the weather conditions are good. Forecasts are positive, the Stanislaw Marusarz's hill is well prepared and the wind should not bother ski jumpers during the competition, so it seems that today we will see a fair and exciting competition. Start list of the team competition is available here!

• By Anna Sobol (@AnneAZS)