For those of you who don’t know me I’m Csanád Erdély, 18 year old forward who is playing his first full season for Fehérvár AV 19 in the EBEL and this is a look into my “rookie” season.
So lets start from the beginning, when it looked like I would not be moving to Canada to play junior hockey in the CHL, at the beginning of July we started to negotiate with the Fehérvár AV 19’s management and we were able to come to an agreement on the contract, I was ready to start the season. With me signing a full professional contract I was starting the training camp with the senior team, of course I knew that this did not guarantee that once the season started the coaching staff would have me on the final roster. If I did not prove myself to the coaching staff I knew that I would be playing most of the season with the U20 side, because of this I set some personal goals for the season, one of this was to play at least 20 games in the EBEL, with regards to scoring points I didn't even really dream about that. As of right now I have doubled the amount of games I set out to play in August, I have played just over 40 games and I was able to score 4 goals and register an assist as well for a total of 5 points, of course am really proud of the 4 goals that are tied to me.
Lets jump back a bit, last season I appeared in six games for the senior team, but the real work with the squad just started this season. The month of August just like any other team is all about preparation and getting ready for the upcoming season, a lot of skating, weight training, learning the tactics and implementing the system for the new season. For our preseason we traveled to Slovakia to Zólyom, Nyitra and Érsekújvár where we played preseason matches mostly against Slovak clubs. This was good because the preseason was very similar to what I had become accustomed to when I played with the junior team. Of course in the past I wasn’t getting ready for the preseason with players that I looked up to as a young kid or I was rooting for from the stands or on TV. Six years ago just like most Hungarian hockey fans I was on the edge of my seat during the world championships in Sapporo and now I’m in the same locker room with some of the player from that team, it is strange at times.
At the end of the preseason the team did not feel like a tight group or not as tight as maybe it should be. The Hungarian players on the team knew each other real well and the import players will still trying to find themselves in the squad, naturally they would hang out separately. This was new to me because up until this season I only played with Hungarians in my youth and junior years, we all spoke the same language and grew up in the same culture and this always made it easier for anyone new to truly become a teammate more smoothly and quicker. Naturally the Hungarian players and including me tried to make them feel at home and part of the team as much as possible. It can't be too easy to just walk through the door and join a new team in a completely foreign country.
At the beginning I felt that I was struggling a bit, I felt that compared to the U20 game speed this was not one level higher but maybe this was a jump or two or three levels. The biggest difference was that everyone is so skilled that the smallest nuances will be the deciding factor on who can score on a 2 on 1 for example. At this level those situation was being completed at an 80% rate. I knew right then that it will take a lot longer than one or two weeks for me to pick up the pace of the game. This is an ongoing process, however I do feel that I am feeling more and more comfortable with the speed but I am also making the correct decision in games more often. Of course this is not that simple, this is a lot more complicated than defending the odd man rush as a center. You have to take into consideration the outside factors that you do not come across as a junior player in a U20 game let alone think about; you have the fans and the media. Today I still have the same feeling when I step on the Fehérvár ice like I did in my first game back in November of 2013, you have to get used to all the new attention you are getting and use it to your advantage. An example of this was the fifth or sixth game of the season and we were playing Olimpija Ljubljana at home, I had a shift where I had two back to back solid checks on two separate players and the crowd went crazy, feeling this you think there can not be anything better and you feel unstoppable. The cheering from the packed stands is a nice energy boost, you feel hungry and you want more. This of course needs to be harnessed, which I still need to learn as well, but I feel that I’m learning. This is where experience comes into the picture, and you can’t learn this from anywhere else but from veteran players and what you have personally experienced on the ice. I regularly turn to older veterans for advice, often they know when to help you through a rough patch as well.
You can also find great motivation in personal success as well as when the team is successful. A player can be in top form when they have a positive attitude towards everything and also a very short memory. When I scored a goal at home against Villach, I took a shot from just about the blue line against arguably the top goalie in the league, there was very little chance that puck would get through, but somehow it did trickle across the goal line. Two games later in Vienna a rebounded bounced out right in front of me, the goal was empty and there were no defenders in sight, I took a backhanded shot that I clanged off the post and wide. It was unbelievable but I did miss a scoring chance that a 12 year old can score on, I don’t say I was unlucky because against Villach I scored a goal that should have been easily saved.
Taking everything into consideration I would say that biggest asset that a player needs to be a true professional is being mentally prepared and being mentally mature regardless of what is going on around them both on and off the ice. If you can not get your self in a positive mental state after a rough patch it will influence your game as well and your everyday life. This is why team sports are so great, you can help each other and to me this is the most important aspect of the game that I have learned in my career with the senior team.
Photo: Attila Soós