Hockey players of the Turkmen “Galkan” were the first to reach the finals at the international tournament taking place in Ashgabat, the main trophy of which is being contested by 10 teams from Asia and Europe, divided into two groups. The wards of Andrei Makarov and Meilis Kuliev achieved this success ahead of schedule, defeating the Feniks team from Uzbekistan in the 4th round match - 9:1 (3:0, 4:0, 2:1), writes TDH.

From the first seconds of the meeting, eight-time champion Turkmenistan unleashed a barrage of attacks on the opponent’s goal, preventing him from leaving his zone. And only the skill of the goalkeeper of the visiting team during the first six minutes did not allow the home team to open the scoring.

The playing advantage of the Turkmen hockey players was so great that even after the removal of one of their defenders it was difficult to understand: who is playing in the minority? Having remained for 2 minutes with four players against five opponent players, “Galkan” organized a quick attack on the left side, which was followed by a magnificent pass to Perhat Atekaev, and he, left alone in front of the goal, opened the scoring with an accurate throw.

As subsequent events showed, Perhat Atekaev was especially on fire that day. As if in training, he managed to pass to the goal, throw shots from different distances, and go one-on-one with the goalkeeper. And therefore it seemed completely unsurprising that the first five goals that flew into the goal of the Uzbek team fell to Perhat Atekaev. This is already the second pentatric at the current tournament. The first goal was scored a day earlier by the Feniks team forward Artyom Varganov, who also hit the goal of the Bahrain Ice Hockey Club from Bahrain five times.

In addition to P. Atekaev, Erkin Kakabaev scored a double for Galkan (28th and 41st minutes) and Baymyrat Baimyradov (39th) and Muhammetyar Nuryev (54th) scored once each. The Uzbek club was able to break up the score only in the last minute of the game thanks to the persistence of Daniel Kogan.

Having won their fourth victory in a row, Galkan scored 12 points and secured first place in Group A ahead of schedule.

Galkan’s opponent in the final will be determined on April 19 on the final day of competition in group “B”, in which the ORHIS-Kazan team from the Republic of Tatarstan of the Russian Federation won an important victory in the fight for first place, beating the Belarusian “Volat” - 6 :3 (3:1, 1:2, 2:0). For the winners, Adel Avzalov scored a hat-trick (1st, 31st and 42nd minutes) and Aidar Miftakhov (3rd), Nasser Sobkhy (13th) and Artur Zaripov (48th) scored once each. For the losers, Eduard Gryn scored a double (19th and 29th), and Nikita Trubitsin scored another goal (33).