Sidney Crosby, please come and play in Switzerland! A final speech, an ode.

No question about that: Sidney Crosby is the best hockey-player in the world, 80% of international hockey-experts agree with this.  Besides that he is a great person and one of the brightest hockey-brains on this planet. Although I really still believe that the lockout will end in December nobody knows this for sure and if the lockout will stop the entire NHL-season rumors get stronger everyday that the world-wide No.1 hockey-player, Sidney Crosby, could come to play in Switzerland. My open letter to the world’s poster-boy of hockey:

The Scouting-Report:

I follow your career since you are 14 years old. As a 15 years old kid I did draft you to my roto-league-junior-team and in the last couple of years you were always the biggest puzzle-piece in my many championship-teams. Thank you for that! Sidney Crosby is the full package in a hockey-player. If you have to design a perfect hockey-player you would come very close to Sidney Crosby. The perfectly designed hockey-player would be maybe just two inches taller but other than that Sid is just perfect. I see a passing game what is the closest thing to Wayne Gretzky’s. Your vision and your hockey-sense are just top-notch! I see a great skater with exceptional acceleration, balance and with outstanding strong legs. You are so extremely strong on your skates that nearly nobody can stop you if you take the puck along the boards and cut into the slot. You are just brilliant in the faceoff-circle. Meanwhile you did develop into a high-end-shooter. I remember you as a junior to be just a good but not a very good shooter yet. So it’s most impressive for me to see that you still improve some skills year by year, even after winning the Stanley Cup. You are a better shooter now than in the season when you did win the Stanley Cup. Do readers know what Sidney Crosby (Stanley Cup Champion, Olympic Champion, multimillionaire) is doing all summer long? Improving his game. You’re working so hard, you are a high-end hockey-analyst. Your passion to the game of hockey is second to none. If you can stay away from further concussions I’m very sure that we even haven’t seen he best Crosby yet. More is to come! Most impressive is your personality. From everything I do know – I don’t know you personally - you are a good person although you are extremely keen on winning and being a good person is most important in the long-term. Worldclass performers - in whatever they do - who stayed on a world-class level for a looooong time were and are most often good, respected persons. Former teammates describe you as a great teammate, not arrogant, down to earth and a true leader on and off the ice. No surprise that you became the youngest NHL-captain. On the ice you also don’t rule out fights and physical plays, you are an extremely gritty player, you go under the opponents skin and you also take the two-way-play very serious. I never did read and listen to such wise, clever and analytic hockey-interviews as I did in the ones with you. I do learn about hockey in nearly everything what you tell about hockey, about certain games, losing- and winning-streaks, and you are also clever and wise enough to admit there is nothing to tell, there is no clue or truth, if there is nothing. You talk about hockey like a wise old hockey-brainer, but you are just 25 years old, unbelievable, you have my deepest respect!

Sidney Crosby, you are the best player in the world!

Why should you come to Switzerland?

The Swiss league is perfect to play without unnecessary risks. The league is not that bad that you get bored to play and not that good that you have to be afraid to lose some of your reputation even in the beginning when you just start to play without being in top-shape. The chance to get seriously injured is also a bit smaller than in some other leagues because our hockey is close to no-contact-hockey. Life in Switzerland is pretty comfortable and you don’t have to adapt an awful lot. You will be at home every night even after the longest road-trip. Short-travelling, healthy ecology, good food, you will like it! In addtion you will have the chance to enjoy playing in the Spengler Cup, it’s the most traditional Christmas-tournament worldwide, very nice atmosphere, great place to sell our sport of hockey, showtime, no hard-nosed hockey. You will find a crowd not as knowledgeable about hockey as average Canadien hockey-crowds but more loud and folkloristic, you will like this experience. You will find some overrated and egocentric coaches who are the kings of the hockey-business, coaches who can decide everything what in Canada decide GMs and owners, you will find open-space-hockey, extremely offensive run and gun hockey, you will find pretty good skaters, although a lot of paper-weights. You will find fast-paced-hockey with bad shooters and just average passing and puck-control-qualities. You will find a spectacular, entertaining hockey-style. You will also find too many folkloristic reporting about the sport of hockey but actually you won’t care about this at all and right you are. Coming to an end: You will enjoy your Swiss experience, I guarantee you this. Switzerland still is a great country in many ways.

Where to go in Switzerland?

Zurich and Lugano are the places the rumors tell about but first of all I want to clarify that with my small consulting-contract in Biel, of course I want that you will come to us, to Biel. Biel has some really smart hockey-guys in the management, a cultic team and a unique, entertaining coach. Although Biel is a small city with a pitoresque lake you will find peace and places of privacy. If you are looking for this: Biel is the perfect place to go. However, I guess it’s not really realistic that you will land in Biel. According to the rumors it’s more realistic that you will chose Zurich or Lugano. If you can’t play in Biel for some reason then please come to Zurich, my most respected Lugano friend Maurizio will forgive me for that ;-).

Why Zurich?

Zurich is by far the most attractive city in Switzerland, it’s not only a Swiss city it’s a world-city, one of the top20 shopping places worldwide. In international surveys Zurich is very often voted the best place to live worldwide and if not the best then always top3. From Zurich you will be everywhere in no time: 45 minutes to the mountains, 2½h to Munich (Germany), 4h to Paris (France), 3h to Milan (Italy). You will find in Zurich a beautiful lake, a very nice old part, excellent small boutiques, international people, not seldom highly educated people. You will find everything what you can find in much larger international cities but with the advantage of not being that hectic and with the huge advantage of driving with your car from point “A” to point “B” in no time, because – although the biggest Swiss city - Zurich is extremely small in international standards. Hockey-wise you will find the team with the best players in Switzerland, a well known Canadien coach with Marc Crawford, with Luca Cunti a very talented young player who might lift his game under your wings to international level. The 10’000-seat rink is a bit strange – to tell the least - probably nobody of all these architects or constructors did ever watch a hockey-game in their lives but still… you will get used to it. You will find good restaurants and you will find privacy because not a lot of people know you over here and if they know you they will be too shy and/or too respectful to bother you. You will enjoy Zurich, I again guarantee!

Please Sid, come to Switzerland, you will enjoy it and we will embrace you!

Stallikon, 1 December 2012 / Thomas Roost