On the eve of the KHL All-Star Game in St. Petersburg, a meeting was held with the heads and general directors of the KHL clubs, at which the president of the league, Alexey Morozov, answered questions from journalists, as well as the officials. Several interesting and important topics were addressed at the same time.
About the time of the season
“We discussed the next season, worked on this issue with the Russian Hockey Federation and now we present in detail what we need to do to play until May 15. In principle, we will obtain the vote of the clubs. Today we tell you everything in detail. In short, we want the season to start on September 5th and end on May 15th.
Will extending the season until May be a step towards the independence of the FHR?
– If it is postponed until May, many things will have to be corrected: signing contracts with players and changing preseason training camps. It does not start on July 15, 50 days before the championship.
Is extending the season until May 15 the first step towards the independence of the FHR? This cannot be called independence. First of all, we have delegation of rights to the championship, it ends on April 30. We will have to request a transfer to the FHR. And the national team is making its tour in May, we must agree that we can also play in May and how it will be, in parallel or not. Only in March-April will it be decided whether the Russian national team will participate in the 2025 World Cup. So, at the end of this season we will understand. If we reach an agreement with the FHR and the clubs support us, we will work on everything, move forward and please the fans. This will be an advantage for us; You have long said that you want to play hockey in May, when the weather is nice. So that fans can enjoy themselves and clubs can organize fan zones in support of their teams.
Meeting with KHL management
Photo: KHL press service
About the limit of foreign players
—We are talking about the legionnaires, in principle there is an understanding. We met with the Ministry of Sports and were preparing to make changes to the order, the Ministry of Sports is ready to discuss this. Now we need to collect the positions of the clubs. We share statistics on how many foreign players we currently have playing in the championship. 58 people, and a year ago the number was 54.
We have spoken to the clubs, we will collect statistics and then we will have to solve the problem with the FHR and the Ministry of Sports, if changes need to be made, as the vote will show. The procedure for making changes takes 3 to 4 months. This needs to be resolved quickly so that everyone knows how many foreign players there will be and can design their own strategy.
On the naturalization of legionnaires.
— Is there an idea to introduce a limit of years after which a legionnaire can be allowed to go through the naturalization process? As I already said, the issue of the limit of foreign players will be resolved by the Ministry of Sports. Of the players in question, only the Dynamo hockey player received citizenship in the summer and was declared a non-legionnaire. He is the only one who received a Russian passport.
Obtaining a passport is a personal matter for each player and what type of citizenship they want to have. No one here can force you. To introduce some kind of limit and calculate it, five years or… Maybe someone wants to come and immediately receive Russian citizenship from the first season, be a citizen of Russia, play for the Russian national team and play in the KHL. Therefore, we see no reason to introduce anything here yet.
Legionnaires still travel to Russia:
Foreigners continue to go to the KHL. The envious Russians failed to isolate the league
About the negotiations with the Ministry of Sports
— We spoke with the Ministry of Sports; Initially, even as the boundary was changing, they said they would monitor the situation and were ready to discuss if changes needed to be made. We will take the initiative, we must tell everything and show what is happening in the League. Everyone said that due to various events, foreigners would be reluctant to come to us, but we have statistics that foreigners come, play in the championship and have a good reputation. The legionnaires help make the games spectacular and lead the league in several indicators. We also see foreign transfers, players are strengthening their teams to achieve their goals. We must help them. We will discuss it and the Ministry of Sports is ready to sit at the negotiating table.
Meeting with KHL management
Photo: KHL press service
About the NSA and exchanges between clubs
—We had a working group with the clubs, where we worked on many issues in detail. The age change for an unrestricted free agent is being discussed: he is now 29 years old or 250 games into his 28th year. We want to lower that age to 27 years old, there were different proposals, at 26 or 28 we were working on it. This issue will be resolved, the majority of clubs support that something needs to be changed, we will adjust our proposals.
In addition, exchanges between clubs (no more than three players, re-signing of players with larger and smaller contracts) two people per season, this was proposed by the clubs. You have to leave some type of play to the clubs, some shoot and others do the opposite. This should not have happened en masse on the team, in order not to overlook the salary floor and cap, a quota was needed.
After the working group a vote was taken, we will now form the final list, which we will present to the board of directors. Questions will also arise about the comfortable life of athletes in the locker rooms of the host cities: the teams now have a difficult schedule, many flights, the teams are forced to carry a lot of things and equipment with them, so here the host clubs must make comfortable changing rooms.
On how clubs terminate contracts
“The screws are being tightened so that this mechanism works equally for everyone and no one takes advantage of any loopholes.” We also brought this issue to the working group and discussed it. This will be presented to the board of directors to be included in the regulations, and here we also want to tighten it. Club heads who do this run a big risk, because according to the regulations, the contract with Serebryakov could be terminated at 50%, but it was terminated at 100%. Leaders must be responsible for this and understand what they are doing. Every year we organize such a working group and work out all the nuances together with the clubs.
If the player agrees to terminate the contract by mutual agreement, he will not receive compensation. We have a mechanism that regulates this issue: if the Club wants, it has to pay compensation depending on the period of the season in which the player is released, and this then falls within the salary cap. You lose a player and you have no release.
That is why we work 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, that is why we are constantly in contact with the clubs: we want our coaches to be responsible for what they do, for who they sign, so that the players have the guarantee that they will receive money. We are working a lot with the clubs, there are fewer delays in salaries, only two clubs have them. This is important for athletes: to receive all their funds after signing the contract.
Another interesting speech by Alexey Morozov:
“We are not violating anything. “We will challenge the IIHF verdict.” Morozov – on the main issues of the KHL
Who most frequently submits arbitration quality requests?
—The level of work of the referees in the first half of the championship? Judges are people too and they make mistakes too. They also carry a big load, you see what a championship we have, games every two days, there are no breaks. It’s difficult for them too. Today there was a report on refereeing. As you know, we have a Judicial Expert Committee headed by René Fasel, which analyzes the games. Today they showed us statistics on how many clubs send applications. The leader in this indicator is Spartak, the second place is occupied by SKA. They use SKA requests the most.
Our main referee does the work and tracks all errors. 16 referees were fined for their errors and these decisions were not made by the SEC, but by the KHL Refereeing Department. We continue to respond not only to what the clubs send, but we also do our job of monitoring the arbitration.
Meeting with KHL management
Photo: KHL press service
About the work of the KHL department, headed by Sergei Gimaev Jr.
—Reestablishment of the players union? In Russia, a players’ union had already been created; Not all players were happy with this mechanism. We understand that players are our main capital, which attracts fans, that is why we have a department of interaction with players, headed by Sergei Gimaev, who participated in the first meeting with all the heads of the clubs. He takes care of all matters and is in contact with the players.
We saw that many players were injured before the All-Star Game, we had to make a decision quickly and look for replacements. Sergei worked quickly, contacted the players and held meetings with all the clubs. He has received many proposals for changes to the regulations to improve the comfort of the players, so Sergei will continue in this direction, communicating with the players and club managers, highlighting the needs that hockey players need. We are not collecting contributions from anyone to participate in this, it is our duty to be attentive.
