Other events in Baltic States

In a crucial Hockey World Championship game marred by multiple penalties and some very questionable referee calls, Latvia was defeated by Belarus 1-3 (0-2, 1-0, 0-1) on Monday, with the host nation qualifying for the quarterfinals, informs LETA.

Team Latvia now has one more game to play in the preliminary round – if Latvia beats the 2013 silver medalists Switzerland on Tuesday, the Latvian team will advance to the quarterfinals too.

In the game, the Belarusian team built a two-goal lead within 33 seconds in the first period, with Geoff Platt and Mikhail Grabovskis firing home in quick succession.

The Belarusian team kept pressing on for most of the first period, although Latvia also had a few good chances, but Belarus's Kevin Lalande allowed no goals in the period.

Latvia had to endure two minor penalties at the start of the second period, followed by a major brawl and punches thrown both sides halfway through the period, involving ten players in total. The game continued much in the same vein until Latvia earned a two-man advantage, and Arturs Kulda quickly made the score 1-2 on a pass from Aleksandrs Nizivijs.

Latvia went on the offensive, creating several decent scoring chances, but no more goals were scored in the second period. The third period started much the same, with the Belarusian team going into defense mode halfway through the third period. This resulted in a power play for Latvia, then another with two minutes to play. This time, Kaspars Daugavins finally scored an equalizer for Latvia 36 seconds before the buzzer – but the goal was disallowed by the referees in a most questionable manner, with the referees ruling that Gints Meija had blocked the Belarusian goalie.

Latvia kept attacking for the remaining seconds, with the goalie pulled, but it was Belarus to score an empty-netter in the last second of the game.

Therefore, Russia is currently in first place in Group B of the preliminary round with 18 points from six games. Belarus is in second place with 12 points, followed by the United States and Finland with 11 points each. Latvia has nine points, Switzerland seven, Germany five and Kazakhstan is last with two points.