French Ice Hockey Federation general manager Eric Ropert has seen his county's national team and national league both raise in quality in recent years and he hopes that continues through to 2017 and beyond. As he explains, the Champions Hockey League can play a vital role in helping the sport become bigger in France. 

by Pavel Kuba

France will co-host the IIHF World Championship in 2017, and the Champions Hockey League can be used as a vital tool to expose the French audience to top-level European hockey over the next couple of seasons – that is the aim of the French Ice Hockey Federation. Hockey in France, according to general manager Eric Ropert, is still developing, with the quality of French players and the level of the sport's popularity both rising. 

What is the significance of the CHL for French hockey?

It's a great competition, and thanks to it we can get a glimpse of hockey in other European countries. It would be wonderful if the CHL reaches the same fame and popularity as in the Champions League in basketball or football. For French hockey, which is still in its development stage, it is great that we can be part of the mechanism from its very beginning. When we first heard about this two years ago we immediately wanted to be part of it.

Last year the Briancon Diables Rouges played in the CHL and didn't win a single game. This year, France has two teams in the competition – Gap Rapaces and Grenoble. Do you think those teams can do better?

Last year for Briancon was very difficult. There were several changes in management, coaches, and the organization as a whole took a while to get going. Briancon had not played any pre-season games before their first CHL game, which made it was very difficult. This year both teams – Gap and Grenoble – know what they're in for and are taking the competition very seriously; both have adapted their pre-season training schedules with the CHL in mind. Of course they will face some very strong teams, but I thkink they will be much more competitive. 

How does hockey compare to other sports in France?

Hockey is progressing in France, but we are still far behind hockey superpowers like Sweden, Finland or the Czech Republic. On the other hand, it is the second-most popular indoor sport in France, so some progress and development has been made. The federation is working with the clubs to constantly try to increase the quality of the national league and the national team. In France, we are not the biggest sport, but we have huge ambitions.

You say that hockey in France is in development. Last year's World Championship in Minsk must have been a huge boost, when France advanced to the quarter-finals for the first time in several years.

Definitely. For the sport to properly develop in any country, it is necessary that the two most important pillars develop simultaneously. These are the league and the national team. Everywhere in Europe it works this way, and this is what we are trying to do in our country. The clubs and the entire league are getting better, and from that some progress is visible on the national team.

The last tournament in Prague, however, did not go so well for France, and just barely avoided relegation. Is that just coincidence or was something different than in Belarus?

I don't think so. Even this year it was not such a bad tournament, even though we were a short distance from relegation. The team certainly had the capacity play better. Once again, we definitely proved that we are not far from great hockey teams, losing to Canada by just one goal and in the game against Switzerland we played well, but just had some bad luck. We did not play badly, but we just didn't get the results we wanted. The team was relatively weak compared to last year, which shows that in France we don't have such a huge choice of quality players. It is necessary that we are all healthy and be in top form at the time of the World Champoinship. The tournament in Prague was a learning experience, and hopefully in 2017 we can at least be as successful as we were in Minsk in front of our home crowd. 

You mentioned 2017, when Paris together with Cologne will host the World Championship. Can you describe how that is going?

Working together with the Germans on this is a huge plus because they have a lot of experience in this from the championship in 2010. We already have a strategy for ticket sales, have hotel partners and have made arrangements with the arena. We have progressed very well in marketing projects to mobilize hockey in both countries, and we even have already signed a contract with a transportation company to move people between Paris and Cologne. The preparations are going well, but the challenge ahead of us will be filling the arena in Paris, and we'll see how that goes. It won't be easy. Our goal is to organize the best possible World Championship in France, to make it a great experience for the teams as well as the fans from France and abroad. I'm not sure if we can do something similar to what happened in the Czech Republis this year, but we will do our best. 

Do you think the fact that the World Championship is coming in a couple years can help draw fans to the CHL?

Definitely. The CHL is one of the major hockey events in France, which we want use to bring more hockey to the French audience. Last year there was a bit of a problem in Briançon to fill the arena, but that was understandable because it was a new product that the audience didn't know yet. It needs to be stabilized and then the image of the competition will be greater. In France, we are very excited to now have two clubs in the competition. They will compete against the best teams in Europe, which will attract new fans and help grow hockey in France.