December 13, 2000

Scouts and agents hang around Siberia

Siberian City Omsk has recently become one of the best producers of players for the national teams of Russia. This year the team demonstrates tremendously good play and will compete for the medals of the Russian Hockey Championships. What makes the play of Avangard Omsk so spectacular is one of the best choices of players in the league and excellent chemistry. On the senior Russian national team there are five representatives of the club. Defenseman Dmitry Ryabykin and four forwards Ilya Gorbushin, Dmitry Zatonsky, Alexander Prokopyev, Ravil Yakubov. The other four players, Alexander Svitov, Yegor Shastin, Stanislav Chistov and Kiril Koltsov, will represent Russia at the upcoming 2000/2001 Junior World Championships in Moscow. Moreover, Avangard Omsk has some very skillful players on the Under-17 team Russia. Three of them, Taratukhin-Perezhogin-Golovin have demonstrated an exceptionally mature play at the recently held Five Nations Tournament in Salt Lake City.

Some of NHL scouts and agents haven even been noticed in the attendance of some of the Avangard games. On December 5,2000 Canadian scout Ben Houdy attended the Avangard-Vityaz match. He tried to keep track on the progress of the 18 year-old Alexander Svitov and Yegor Shastin. Stanislav Chistov who is only 18 years old was also a keen object of his attention. At the end of the game, he commented on the play of young Russians, “I liked Svitov and Chistov in the action. As for Yegor Shastin his main drawback is his speed.”