After 10 games, the intensity during Montreal Canadiens training sessions hasn’t diminished. Head coach Martin St-Louis makes sure of that and is convinced that his squad can only benefit from this.
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After a day off, the Habs were back on the ice in St. Louis on Monday, on the eve of a duel against the Minnesota Wild. The instructor tried to recreate game situations that could be useful against Marc-André Fleury’s team.
“We’re trying to create game situations,” St-Louis confirmed in a press conference. If you fail to create that environment in practice and ask players to pressure read the game, then who is to blame? [en cas d’échec]? With the players or the coaches? I accept this responsibility.
“It really helps players who have less ice or aren’t playing. You may have game situations during training. It’s good for a lot of businesses.”
treatments
After Evgenii Dadonov was out against the Blues on Saturday, he was conspicuously absent from today’s training session. While the team posted on social media that he would be treated for a day, St. Louis got the short end when reporters asked him about it.
“That’s what I was told,” he said of the treatments. “Listen guys. He wasn’t on the ice today. Stop. You’ve already asked about it,” he added, exasperated, at the first reminder.
However, he went on to say that he liked the attitude and work ethic of the boisterous players and that he made sure to be fully transparent about his decisions to promote a good working environment.
“When a player isn’t playing, attitude is important, work ethic is important, that’s all that matters. They have to live up to their responsibilities to come back in a match. So far I have that.
“[La communication] is important to everyone. We have a pretty difficult situation with 15 attackers. It is an even more important “job”.
After that duel against the Wild in St. Paul, the team will return to Canada via Winnipeg, where they will face the Jets on Thursday night. The Canadiens are 5-4-0 so far this season. He won his last two games and it was the Savages who caused his latest 3-1 defeat last Tuesday.