Official opening of Ice Hockey stadium in Dundalk

With sports that the Irish don't really care about on the agenda these days with the cricket world cup, the new hockey arena in Dundalk will be used for the first time tonight when Ireland take on the Dundalk Bulls at 8 pm. Three clubs seem to have been founded including the Dublin Rams, but they all seem to be based out of this new arena. The World Championships are around the corner now, they'll take place through April. Tickets are available on the website: http://www.iiha.org/organisation/index.php

We open the championships on the 15th of April against Mongolia with the final game of the round robin tournament (it's a straight league with no playoffs) between Ireland and the Netherlands on the 21st.

Six nations are taking part in all, Ireland, Mongolia, South Africa, New Zealand, the Netherlands and Luxembourg.

That's a pretty eclectic gathering. I think Ireland have a possiblity of doing well enough, certainly won't take the wooden spoon anyway.

I fancy Mongolia purely on the basis that they have the coldest capital city in the world.

Dundalk lost 4-2 to Ireland, (Dundalk vs. Ireland - I like the look of that) Ireland scoring in the last few minutes with our goalie pulled. Damn Ireland. There is talk we are going to apply to join the UK league. Dundalk Bulls Belfast Giants derby, I like it!

How much public funds went into this facility? Can GAA be played on the ice? If not, I think it's a disgrace that the youth of Dundalk shall be restricted to a diet of a foreign game like Ice Hockey.

Here's the Dundalk jersey.
http://www.dundalkbulls.com/images/jersey.jpg

Its not foreign. Irish people have been playing hurling on frozen ponds since the 1200s. Its the true national game

I used to play left wing for an ice hockey team, maybe if I ever move to Ireland I could play for this team. How is the quality (I suppose do your best to compare it to something, I don't know how you would)
There are a few good Irish hockey players over here (Irish-American or Irish-Canadian that is)
Brendan Morrison is the first one who comes to mind

Dundalk beat a Finnish team 5-2 yesterday. Don't know about the quality as I haven't had a chance to get down yet.

Holiday, do you know anything about the Dublin that's been founded? Is the plan not to set up a domestic Irish league? I think they want to build up the grassroots of the Irish game slowly rather than jump the gun and send a team into the British league.

theworm, as someone who watches the NHL I find watching the Irish team as excruciating as having my teeth pulled. The standard is very very low from what I've seen. A lot of elementry errors made like taking many penalties for too many men on the ice.

There are currently three clubs in the Republic of Ireland. Dublin Flyers, Dublin Rams and the Dundalk Bulls. Yeah the hope is to start up an Irish League but there is big money behind the Dundalk Bulls. They have assembled a good squad and I think the aim for them is the Elite Hockey League in the UK. They have all the under ages teams from under 10 up to 18 in place that are required for EHL entry. However I don't think they have any native players on the side and the EHL have a cap on the number of foreigners that can play for any side. I think they would definitely get the backing of the Belfast Giants as it would at least reduce their huge travelling expenses somewhat. And other clubs coming over from Britain could play each them and us in the same week to cut down on costs.

How do two Dublin clubs exist when the only rink in the state has just opened up?

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Originally Posted by holidaysong

Dundalk lost 4-2 to Ireland, (Dundalk vs. Ireland - I like the look of that) Ireland scoring in the last few minutes with our goalie pulled. Damn Ireland. There is talk we are going to apply to join the UK league. Dundalk Bulls Belfast Giants derby, I like it!

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To be honest, even if a team based out of Dundalk were to join a UK League it's extremely unlikely they'd ever play a senior competitive game against the Belfast Giants..

The structure next season will be..
- Top flight: Elite League - professional, with mostly imported players.
- 2nd tier: English Premier League + Scottish Premier League - semi-pro (the meaning of which tends to vary by club). Limit of 3 imported players.
- 3rd tier: English National League (split into North and South divisions) + Scottish National League - amatuer.

There's a huge quality difference between the leagues, so it's very rare these days that teams play anyone above or below their own level.. No formal promotion/relegation is in place, for the most part teams get to choose which level they compete at.

Belfast play in the top flight and to be honest there's no chance of Dundalk being accepted at that level, unless there's some huge financial backing behind them.

Poor Student, they were only formed (re-formed in the case of the Flyers) during 2006 and will use the Dundalk Ice Dome as their home for training and matches. I think it would be better to get a rink built in Dublin and try and get a Dublin team into the EHL (alongside a Dundalk team) rather than the long wait we would have on our hands to have enough rinks to make a domestic league viable.

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Originally Posted by incident

To be honest, even if a team based out of Dundalk were to join a UK League it's extremely unlikely they'd ever play a senior competitive game against the Belfast Giants..

The structure next season will be..
- Top flight: Elite League - professional, with mostly imported players.
- 2nd tier: English Premier League + Scottish Premier League - semi-pro (the meaning of which tends to vary by club). Limit of 3 imported players.
- 3rd tier: English National League (split into North and South divisions) + Scottish National League - amatuer.

There's a huge quality difference between the leagues, so it's very rare these days that teams play anyone above or below their own level.. No formal promotion/relegation is in place, for the most part teams get to choose which level they compete at.

Belfast play in the top flight and to be honest there's no chance of Dundalk being accepted at that level, unless there's some huge financial backing behind them.

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It is the top flight that is being mentioned for Dundalk. One of the lower leagues wouldn't be worthwhille.

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Originally Posted by holidaysong

and I think the aim for them is the Elite Hockey League in the UK. They have all the under ages teams from under 10 up to 18 in place that are required for EHL entry. However I don't think they have any native players on the side and the EHL have a cap on the number of foreigners that can play for any side. I think they would definitely get the backing of the Belfast Giants as it would at least reduce their huge travelling expenses somewhat. And other clubs coming over from Britain could play each them and us in the same week to cut down on costs.

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Whats the capacity of the Dundalk rink? From the photos it looks to be quite small, I would expect that they'd need a *minimum* of 2,000 seats to be accepted (given the way that Fife and Dundee were controversially rejected a couple seasons ago).

The cap on imports isn't a significant obstacle - The (very simplified) definition of an "import" is someone who wasn't trained in Britain or Ireland so any Irish side could easily bring in a few British players to make up the numbers. Out of a (typical) 16 man squad, teams are allowed up to 10 imports so it's not like the domestic players get a huge amount of ice time anyway.

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Originally Posted by incident

Whats the capacity of the Dundalk rink? From the photos it looks to be quite small, I would expect that they'd need a *minimum* of 2,000 seats to be accepted (given the way that Fife and Dundee were controversially rejected a couple seasons ago).

The cap on imports isn't a significant obstacle - The (very simplified) definition of an "import" is someone who wasn't trained in Britain or Ireland so any Irish side could easily bring in a few British players to make up the numbers. Out of a (typical) 16 man squad, teams are allowed up to 10 imports so it's not like the domestic players get a huge amount of ice time anyway.

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Ok I wasn't sure how much of an obstacle the imports would be. The capacity is 1,250 as far as I know.

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Originally Posted by holidaysong

It is the top flight that is being mentioned for Dundalk. One of the lower leagues wouldn't be worthwhille.

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Fair enough, I can't really see it happening but you never know for sure with British Ice Hockey..

The Elite League has said several times that they don't want to go above 10 teams (from what I remember, that was the official reason given for refusing Fife + Dundee entry).

As of right now, they've got their 10 teams - although there's rumours that Cardiff and/or Basingstoke are planning to drop a level. (the Basingstoke rumour appears pretty much every year, Cardiff allegedly have money trouble after moving rink).

If one of those sides were to drop out then it'd open up a spot in the league with no obvious replacement, and so they might possibly be more lenient on the entry criteria. If Cardiff + Basingstoke both stay in the EIHL, then a Dundalk side would be very unlikely.

Well I heard that a team from Liverpool are looking to get in, expanding it to 12 with us being the other team. We'll see how the World Championships Division III go in Dundalk in a months time. It could boost the Dundalk Bulls case a lot if it can attract good crowds.