Today, the six Finnish teams announced that they will pull from the Nordic Trophy tournament. Will this spell an end to the plans for a Nordic league?

The past few days in European hockey have been eventful. First, peace was restored within Swedish hockey as the five renegating clubs (the socalled NT clubs) were brought back to the fold by not only agreeing that the future of Swedish hockey should be studied under the auspicies of HockeyLigan, the body that governs Elitserien, but also promising to negotiate a new stakeholder agreement which would in effect keep their ties with Elitserien. Then came IIHF's announcement that the Champions Hockey League has been put to rest. And today exploded the most unexpected bomb when the six Finnish teams of the Nordic Trophy announced that they withdraw from the tournament with immediate effect. The Finnish teams include Jokerit, HIFK, Tappara, TPS, Turky, Lukko Rauma and Kärpät.

The Nordic Trophy is a pre-season tournament that has existed since 2006. This season it was planned to expand the tournament from 10 to 12 teams. This season it was also planned to to extend the tournament geographically with the inclusion of the Norwegian champions of Vålerenga. In April, Vålerenga, however, declined from participating citing the financial crisis as a reason. Nevertheless, the Nordic Trophy was widely perceived to be a stepping stone for the creation of a Nordic, if not a European, hockey league. A great deal of the controversy about the future of the Swedish Elitserien has evolved around the richest Swedish hockey clubs participation in the Nordic Trophy and the revelations that these clubs were secretly planning a Nordic league with their Finnish counterparts. This controversy reached its climax on a few weeks ago.

On this background, the announcement of the Finnish clubs dropped like a regular bombshell.

Neither the director of the tournament, Bo Lennartsson, nor the Swedish clubs were apparently consulted before the Finnish clubs made their announcement. They learned about it either through a press release made by the directors of the Finnish clubs or through the Finnish and Swedish media.

"We are very disappointed about their behavior", Bo Lennartson says to Aftonbladet, "we don't know exactly why they pulled out. We have received no explanations." Mike Helber, Linköpings' club director, concurs. "It came like a bolt from the blue".

Further details about Finnish clubs' plans have been revealed in the Finnish media. According to Keijo Säilynoja, the General Manager of Jokerit, the Finnish NT clubs plan to do two things: first, create their own pre-season tournament with a total prize money sum of €60,000, and second, to focus on the further development of the Finnish SM-Liiga.

Whatever their motives--be it the financial crisis, second-thoughts about the viability of a inter-national league (perhaps in the light of yesterday's collapse of the CHL) or a response to the new-found Swedish unity last week-- the collapse of the Nordic Trophy may very well spell an end to the discussion of a Nordic league.

The Swedish NT clubs will probably continue to arrange a pre-season tournament under the auspicies of the Nordic Trophy, but it will become an exclusive Swedish affair.

UPDATE

The schedule for the seperate Finnish pre-season tournament will look like this:

06 August 2009: Tappara - Jokerit
06 August 2009, Kärpät - HIFK

07 August 2009, HIFK - TPS
07 August 2009, Jokerit - Lukko Rauma

08 August 2009, Lukko Rauma - Kärpät

11 August 2009, Kärpät - Tappara
11 August 2009, TPS - Lukko Rauma

13 August 2009, Tappara - HIFK
13 August 2009, Kärpät - Jokerit

18 August 2009, TPS - Tappara
18 August 2009, HIFK - Lukko Rauma

20 August 2009, Lukko Rauma - Tappara
20 August 2009, TPS - Kärpät
20 August 2009, HIFK - Jokerit

21 August 2009, Jokerit - TPS

Late August: Gold and bronze medal games

Prize money: €60,000. €30,000 to the winner, €20,000 to the runners up and €10,000 to the bronze medal winner