Russia has suffered a 2-0 home defeat to Finland in a key warm-up match for next month’s ice hockey world championships.
Russia remained a point behind Sweden in the tour standings after the Swedes lost 4-3 to the Czech Republic in Thursday’s other game in the first round of the final stage of the tour.
The tour fixtures are the last major preparation for coach Zinetula Bilyaletdinov’s Russia side ahead of the world championships, which start in Finland and Sweden on May 4.
Bilyaletdinov promised a different attitude when Russia plays Sweden in Brno on Sunday.
“We’ll try to approach the next game differently. It’s always good but you can’t have victories without defeats and we need to think about that,” he said Thursday.
“They didn’t surprise us in any way today, we just weren’t very lucky.”
Mikko Maenpaa opened the scoring for the Finns on a power play in the 33rd minute, with former Nashville Predators wing Antti Pihlstrom adding Finland’s second goal 16 seconds before the final siren.
