The introduction of the national team support staff started with the equipment managers, moved on to the physio members and now we continue with the team managers.
STAFF
Head coach: Rich Chernomaz
Coaches: Gergely Majoross , Diego Scandella, Tamás Sille, Viktor Tokaji
Goalie coach: Gary Clark
Strength and conditioning: Sándor Puskás
GM: Attila Nagy
Team leader: Lajos Imre
Doctor: Ernő Majzik
Physio: Imre Bagonya, Tamás Sashalmi
Equipment managers: József Nagy, Gábor Tornyi
Like the rest of the support staff members the team manager position has also expanded in recent years as originally for years there was only one staff member, both current team managers have taken their own road to the national team.
Lajos Imre has been working with the national team since 2008 just months after the win in Sapporo and was there for the lead up to the A-Pool world championships in 2009. “Luigi” is a hotel front office manager in his civil life but he always has an eye on ice hockey, he originally started as the team manager with the women’s national team before being called for to the men’s team.
Attila Nagy is younger both in age and in years spent with the senior national team since he only joined the staff in 2014 at the request of head coach Rich Chernomaz. However, Ati is not inexperienced as he had worked with the U20 and U18 national teams as the team manager. Aside from this he is also a referee for the IIHF, EBEL and the MOL League.
The two team managers do not have the exact same work responsibilities and for this Attila is the GM not the same general manager position as in North America, with Lajos officially being called the Team Leader.
Attila Nagy
Once there was the two of you working next to the national team how did you two decided to split the work?
We looked at who had more experience working with each area, Luigi is very familiar with the hotel business and taking care of accommodations and I’m more familiar with the hockey side of things. It was pretty clear who would take what part of the original one man position.
Was it a smooth transition as you guys started to work together?
I think we fit together well, and we have a nice balance with the age difference, there is no friction between us at all. Luigi sees things from a different side that I might not think of, this first week of camp proves that we work well as it has gone by problem free.
How did you end up with the senior team in the first place?
It all started at the 2014 world championships in South Korea when Rich Chernomaz took Miklós Németh the HIHF president at the time and showed him what the Austrian and the Slovenian locker rooms looked like, the size of their staff and said that these teams move up to the A-Pool not just because of the players but also because of the support staff, Németh agreed with him. In the summer of 2014 Chernomaz, Csaba Kovács HIHF vice president, Zoltán Kovács secretary general, and youth director Glen Williamson and myself sat down and it was decided that I would join Luigi on the national team support staff.
How hard is it to balance your work with the Hungarian Ice Hockey Federation and your work as a ref?
Some people collect stamps or play squash this is what I do, when there is an international break the EBEL is on a break as well. Luckily I work with some great people in both organizations and this way I can work any problems out.
Is it hard to work with a roster that is 70+?
More paper is used to print the rosters on. :) I like that there are this many people in the race for the team.
What does it mean for you that you are getting ready for an A-Pool world championships?
For me a lot, it is great that we are playing against the elite of this sport. It also shows that the changes that we have made in the past year has helped and you can see the changes that the team went through between South Korea and Poland.
Lajos Imre
How did this position come about?
As our staff grew larger there were two people to cover each area, which is great since we are A-Pool team after all. We have two equipment managers and two physios and now there are two team managers as well. I used to work 365 days a year with hockey next to my regular job when I worked alone. I was very happy when Attila was assigned next to me.
When Attila joined you did you sit down and talk to him about how you would split the workload?
It kind of worked out by itself but we did sit down and talk about how things will be. I have knowledge about the hotel industry and he is more on the hockey side of things.
How trickey of a week is this for you guys with almost 80 guys in camp?
This is a larger amount than we usually work with, this is interesting from the logistics side of things such as finding enough locker rooms for the players and the coaches. However, there is not much more work compared to that there are more guys.
Is there any difference for you as we have moved from being a Division 1/A team to being an A-Pool team?
The preparation time is a lot more than usual, and everyone knows that this is a higher level and we need to take this seriously. I don’t think the job is different than in any other years. What will be different is the teams that we will be facing.
Photo: László Mudra
ROSTER
Goalies (9): ARANY Gergely, BÁLIZS Bence (MAC Budapest), DUSCHEK Dávid (Dunaújvárosi Acélbikák), GYENES Dávid, KISS Bence (DVTK-Jegesmedvék), HETÉNYI Zoltán, RAJNA Miklós (Fehérvár AV19), PLESZKÁN József (UTE), VAY Ádám (Debreceni HK)
Defencemen (26): ARANY Máté, LÁDAY Tamás, ORBÁN Attila, REITER Attila, SZABÓ Dániel, SZALLER Márk, SZIRÁNYI Bence, VARGA Arnold, VOKLA Roland, WEHRS Kevin (Fehérvár), DÓSA Krisztián, KISS Dániel (UTE), GARÁT Zsombor, HERNER Olivér, JÁSZAI Dávid, MESTYÁN István, NAGY Patrik, POZSGAI Tamás, STIPSICZ Bence (MAC), DUDÁS Jesse, GŐZ Balázs, SAGERT Kalvin, VOJTKÓ Mátyás, (DVTK), VAS Márton (Fassa), ERDÉLYI Tamás (Ferencváros Bp. ESMTK), HRUBY Gellért (Dunaújváros)
Forwards (43): BANHAM Frank, BARTALIS István, BENK András, KOCSIS Ferenc, KOVÁCS Csaba, KÓGER Dániel, NAGY Gergő, REISZ Áron, SARAUER Andrew, SÁRPÁTKI Tamás, SIKORCIN Ladislav, SZABÓ Krisztián, VINCZE Péter (Fehérvár), CSÁNYI Karol, GÁGYOR Péter, NEMES Benjámin, TURBUCZ Martin, VIRÁG Tamás (UTE), ERDÉLY Csanád (Sioux Falls), GALANISZ Nikandrosz, HAJÓS Roland, MISKOLCZI Márk, PAVUK Attila, SOMOGYI Balázs, TÓTH Adrián (DVTK), GALLÓ Vilmos (Linköping), HÁRI János (Leksand), HÁRI Norbert, KÖNCZEI Áron, VINCZE Péter Tamás (Debrecen), KERESZTURY Erik (Düsseldorf), KISS Zsombor (Davos), MAGOSI Bálint (Briancon), NAGY Krisztián, NÉMETH Attila, ROCZANOV Dezső, SCHMÁL Kristóf, TERBÓCS István, TÓTH Richárd (MAC), SÁGI Martin (Feldkirch), SEBŐK Balázs (KalPa), SOFRON István (Klagenfurt), VAS János (Slavia Praha)
SPRING SCHEDULE
Exibition games
April 15th, Friday, 18.00 (Budapest): v Austria
April 16th, Saturday, 16.30 (Vienna): @Austria
April 20th Wednesday, 19.00 (Budapest): v Slovenia
April 29th, Friday, 19.00 (Budapest): v Kazakhstan
April 30th, Saturday, 19.00 (Budapest): v Russia B
World Championships, Russia
Group B (St. Petersburg)
May 7th, Saturday, 12.15 (11.15): v Slovakia
May 8th, Sunday, 12.15 (11.15): v Canada
May 10th, Tuesday, 20.15 (19.15): v France
May 11th, Wednesday, 20.15 (19.15): v Finland
May 13th, Friday, 16.15 (15.15): v USA
May 14th, Saturday, 16.15 (15.15): v Belarus
May 16th, Monday, 20.15 (19.15): v Germany
(CET)