Trust Is Everything, or Nothing: Rulík on the National Team, Kladno and Jágr

Radim Rulík has ended his three-year spell with the Czech national hockey team and taken charge at Extraliga club Kladno. The move follows a celebrated run that ended with a quarter-final defeat to Canada at the Olympics.

Rulík described that result as a seemingly bitter conclusion to the team’s campaign. After the success in Prague, the Olympic exit left an unfinished sense of what might have been. He has now decided that the time has come to move on.

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Compare an overseas coach who coaches 82 games in the NHL and then goes to the world championship. He does three times as much as we do.

“I felt that I needed a change. You start to lose confidence a little,” Rulík said. He also pointed to the different demands placed on coaches in the Czech national setup and in the NHL.

“Compare an overseas coach who coaches 82 games in the NHL and then goes to the world championship. He does three times as much as we do,” the coach said. His remarks frame the decision as a personal need for a new challenge, rather than simply a change of club.

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I felt that I needed a change. You start to lose confidence a little.