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Europeans create transfer deal with NHL, minus Russia

A two-year agreement on transfers between European clubs and the National Hockey League was reached Tuesday -- including the Czech Republic but not Russia, assuring participation of NHL players at the 2006 Olympics in Turin, the International Ice Hockey Federation said.

The Russian federation rejected the deal, which regulates financial compensation, a limit on the number of players that can leave Europe annually, and imposes a transfer deadline.

"Any players signed by the NHL from Russia will not be regulated by the Player Transfer Agreement," the IIHF said in a statement late Tuesday evening.

The five other countries who agreed to sign on with the Czech Republic were Finland, Germany, Slovakia, Sweden and Switzerland. The deadline this season for player transfers from the six countries to the NHL will be Aug. 24.

The two-year agreement ends June 15, 2006.

The IIHF said it will announce further details of the agreement when it is signed by the parties involved, likely in September.

"I am very pleased that we were finally able to reach this agreement with the six countries," IIHF President Rene Fasel said. "I regret deeply that a hockey nation like Russia is not part of it. We did everything we could to convince them to join but the owners of clubs of the Russian league were not willing to authorize the Russian ice hockey federation to sign the agreement.

"This was also a bump on the road toward what we two weeks ago assumed was NHL-players' participation in Turin 2006, but this obstacle has now also been cleared and we can look forward to another Olympic hockey feast in February."

The Russian clubs would like to deal directly with NHL clubs in determining player compensation.

Refusing to sign the agreement could leave the Russian federation at risk of losing its players for nothing; the NHL could lure away any player it wants at any time without any compensation.

The Czechs had initially balked at the terms of the agreement, saying the minimum amount of compensation the NHL pays to European federations to sign players is too low. However, they reversed their decision Tuesday.

"Eight clubs were in favor while six were against," Lubos Kozeluh, a deputy head of the Czech federation, said in a statement.

Czech officials said the minimum compensation for any draft pick is set at US$200,000. The Czechs wanted to raise it from the originally proposed US$150,000 to US$300,000.
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