MOSCOW, December 23 (R-Sport) – The KHL could expand into Italy and Croatia next season, league president Alexander Medvedev said Sunday.
The Russian-based hockey competition is perennially seeking to grow, and the mooted accession of Milano Rossoblu and Medvescak Zagreb could take the number of countries represented to nine.
“The chances are very good that at least one of the two teams will join the league next season,” Medvedev said in comments to the website of Kazakh team Barys Astana.
Milano was in talks to join during last season, but the plans fell apart for financial reasons, while Medvescak is currently playing in a different foreign competition, the Austrian Hockey League.
Milano Rossoblu have a rich hockey history, winning 15 Italian championships and two Spengler Cups, while Zagreb is 16-time Croatian champion.
Medvedev, meanwhile, also hopes to rope in other teams from Russia, which dominates the league with 20 teams.
“We also hope that such teams as Lada [Togliatti] will return to the KHL. Lada has not yet filed an application, but Medvescak and Milano have good chances.”
Lada won two Russian titles in the 90s but was suspended from the KHL ahead of the 2010-2011 season due to financial problems and a home arena of insufficient capacity.
Another bold idea belonging to NHL Hall of Famer Slava Fetisov is to create a fifth, Pacific division incorporating teams from Japan, South Korea and China as well as Amur Khabarovsk, to date the league's most easterly team, and a yet-to-be-founded club in Vladivostok.
Fetisov said he could see the Pacific division coming online in 2014.
