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TYRONE SIU / REUTERS
With 16 players who were born in North America, host China goes into the ice hockey tournament of the Olympic Games in Beijing.
Thirteen players out of the 25-strong squad are Canadian and three are from the United States.
There is also one from Russia.
They all have Chinese citizenship.
Of the players, Jake Chelios has the most prominent name.
The 30-year-old is the son of NHL legend Chris Chelios, who played in the world's top ice hockey league for 26 years.
Chelios junior, who played five games for the Detroit Red Wings, has been under contract with the Chinese KHL club Kunlun Red Star since 2019.
Brandon Yip has more experience.
The 36-year-old played 174 games in the NHL and goaltender Jeremy Smith had ten games in the North American league.
Incidentally, the players were listed under Chinese names: Ty Schulz, son of a German father and a Chinese mother, is listed there as Zheng Enlai.
The Olympic squad is made up entirely of the Kunlun team, a Chinese-owned team that takes part in the Russian KHL – the club last played its home games in Moscow because of Corona.
Only six players remain from the last World Cup in 2019 in the fourth-rate Division IIA.
Double-digit defeats are expected
According to the rules of the World Ice Hockey Federation IIHF, four years of game practice are actually necessary in the country whose nationality an actor adopts.
For the Olympics, the regulations have been adapted to the IOC statutes.
Like most other naturalized players, Chelios could only play for China next year at a World Cup.
The IIHF only decided in November that China would actually be allowed to host the men's tournament in Beijing.
There were fears that the team was too bad: The 32nd in the world rankings has no sporting chance, double-digit defeats are expected by some experts.
In order to be able to keep up to some extent, the Kunlun players were relied on, although they are by far the bottom of the KHL table.
China is the second preliminary round opponent of the German national team on February 12 in Beijing.
The USA, although without NHL stars, and Canada are also in the group.
bka/sid/Reuters
