The seeds were planted for an international European club hockey championship at the 2012 Hockey Forum in Barcelona. Now, two years later, the Champions Hockey League is set to drop the puck.

by Shaun Nicolaides

Having a goal is one thing, making it happen is another. European ice hockey has long such lacked a top-level championship in which the best clubs from around the continent can compete against each other on a regular basis, and the Champions Hockey League is something which fans have long such been dreaming of. That dream has now turned into a reality.

The goal from the outset was to create an elite European club competition which would be held annually, and in Barcelona in the summer of 2012 the initial foundations were laid. At the Hockey Forum in Barcelona, after a summit meeting involving representatives of top European clubs and the IIHF, firm conclusions were made for the making of a yearly European club competition. This league however would have to be run parallel with the respective domestic leagues of the participants, as to keep domestic championships running healthily both in a sporting and financial manner.

Later on in that summer, the recommendations were then approved by the three main stakeholders in the tournament, the Club International Working Group, the International Breaks Scheduling Group and the Co-ordination Group, who then eventually presented their plans to the IIHF in early 2013 to have the competition up and running for the 2014/2015 season. The IIHF did indeed follow to approve the basic structure of the idea, and as the making of the competition went on further it was given a working name as the ECC (European Club Competition).

In April 2013 the Barcelona Coordination Working Group met in Copenhagen, and as a result of that meeting the Copenhagen Coordination Group was formed as to solely push the whole project further on. After the IIHF congress had approved the ECC framework presented to them, in May the ECC Commercial Rights were released. Five bids were initially made very quickly, and this showed everyone that if some of Europe’s biggest sports marketing businesses were eager, this project was on the right track.

In July the European Trophy clubs held their annual meeting in Prague, where for the first time firm concrete plans for the tournament were presented to the clubs. A little later on in August in Zurich, major meetings involving shareholding proportions within the ECC proved to be successful, and the project managed to gain staff involved with the IIHF to take complete control of proceedings. In October 2012 the playing dates for the inaugural season were agreed, and the whole project was nearing towards completion.

The final name given to the competition, the Champions Hockey League, was agreed on in a Berlin meeting and on the 9th of December 2013 the C.H.L. was officially announced to all fans. Slightly later all of the participating clubs were informed on the plans for the debut season, and the Champions League Hockey League held its first press conference in Berlin, a conference that turned out to be very successful.

It certainly hasn’t been an easy road from Barcelona to now, but the end result is one that all hockey fans around the continent could have only dreamed of. The Champions Hockey League is a tournament that the sport needs, and the dream has finally come to fruition.