Dusseldorf gladiators
The Düsseldorfer Inline-Hockey-Verein (DIHV) Gladiators , or Düsseldorf Gladiators for short, is an inline hockey team that takes part in the games of the German Inline Hockey League ( DIHL ). Many ice hockey professionals of the DEG Metro Stars , but also players z. B. the Krefeld penguins form the backbone of the team. The roster will be increased with junior players and players from the Oberliga and Regionalliga NRW. DEG professionals Jochen Reimer , Patrick Reimer , Robert Dietrich , Fabio Carciola , Peter Boon , Marián Bažány and DEG captain Daniel Kreutzer are currently active for the Gladiators. In addition, former DEG professionals such as Udo Schmid or Carsten Gossmann can be found in the ranks of the gladiators. The sporting director of the Gladiators is Wolfgang Reinhardt.
history
The DIHV Gladiators was founded at the end of the 90s on the initiative of some DEG players who wanted to keep fit in the summer with inline hockey, among other things . In the 1996 DIHL , the Düsseldorf Gladiators quickly became a relatively successful team, but they were long in the shadow of the DEG Rhein Rollers. After participating in the finals in 2002, when the champions Munich Wanderers Germering lost 6-7 after a penalty shoot-out, the German championship title was brought to Düsseldorf in 2004. In a - especially in the second match extremely exciting - final round played in the best-of-three mode against the Königsbrunn penguins, they prevailed 7: 3 and 4: 3. The Gladiators also played quite successfully in the following years, but always had the problem that hardly any or no teams took part in inline hockey games in North Rhine-Westphalia, so that the Bavarian teams, which are usually better prepared, only played off in the play-off games encountered. The curious situation of the "lack of teams" meant that before the start of the final rounds you usually only had to play one game against a representative of the North German Inline Hockey League (including a 29: 1 (!) Against the Celle Oilers in 2007), and then went straight to the quarter-finals. In the 2007 season, however, they managed to participate quite successfully (2nd place) in an international tournament in Brno / Czech Republic . This tournament turned out to be very good preparation, because the gladiators qualified for the Final Four tournament in Germering with the Rolling Wanderers Germering based there. After a 6-5 success in the semifinals against the Landsberg Vipers, they met the reigning champion Germering. After they had made up a temporary 1: 4 deficit, they still lost after extra time due to a power play goal by Germering, which followed a controversial penalty time for the gladiators, 6: 7 after extra time. Despite the defeat, they finished the 2007 season very successfully as runner-up.
2008 season
For the 2008 season the Gladiators have a new attack on the German league title this time jointly by DRIV and DEB organized Dihl planned. Accordingly, the team has strengthened itself again with numerous DEL professionals (including Henrik Hölscher and Boris Blank ), and there are also some talents from the major and regional leagues (Alexander Engel, Tobias Stolikowski, Marc Höveler, Eugen Novossolov) and inline hockey veteran André Wilmshöfer . In addition, another team was founded, the Young Gladiators Düsseldorf, in which mainly the players from the Düsseldorf DNL team are used, supported by veteran Henrik Hölscher or Christian Flügge. Together with the inline hockey team of the Ratinger Ice Aliens , they form Group B of Division North in the German Inline Hockey League. In this way - unlike in previous years - a certain game operation is guaranteed. With three sovereign victories (10: 6 against the Young Gladiators, 11: 6 and 18: 6 against the Ratinger Ice Aliens) they qualified early as the leader of the table for the quarter-final tournament, which took place on June 8, 2008 in the second hall at the ice rink at the Brehmstrasse took place. Here they defeated the Braunschweig Vipers with 22: 0 in a game that was canceled after two quarters. In the decisive game against the Dare Devils Mannheim, a 19: 6 success was achieved, with which they sovereignly qualified for the semi-finals. On June 14th, the semi-final tournament was played against local rivals DEG Rhein Rollers and the Assenheim Patriots . After Assenheim had been defeated 8: 4, the decision to participate in the final in the game against the DEG Rhein Rollers had to be made, who were successful in the first game of the tournament against Assenheim 5: 2. The Rhein Rollers were surprisingly clearly relegated to their place with 10: 4, so that the Gladiators take part in the final of the German Inline Hockey Championship again. On July 5, 2008, the first home was the long-standing rival and final opponent of last year, the Rolling Wanderers Germering. Here they were very narrowly defeated 6: 7. The difference in this game was made by Michael Wolf , the Iserlohn Roosters ice hockey professional , who scored three goals on his own. The second leg took place on July 13th in Germering. In this second final game the Düsseldorf Gladiators had no chance and were clearly defeated with 3:10, so that they had to be content with the runner-up title again.
2009 season
In the 2009 season, there are fewer teams in the DIHL's northern group than opponents of the gladiators. Only the inline hockey team of Ratinger Ice Aliens could be persuaded to participate in the DIHL, local rival DEG Rhein Rollers is only active in the IHD - Bundesliga. The Young Gladiators, who also participated in the DIHL last year, were not sent back into the race. The bloodletting of teams in the DIHL has thus further intensified. To further prepare for the season, the gladiators will also take part in a charity game with the Bundesliga skater hockey club Ahauser Maidy Dogs.