I’ve never pretended to be a fan of Canadiens head coach Jacques Martin, but there are times when I have to shake my head in wonder at the willingness of any coach to attempt to helm one of the most high-profile teams in the NHL.
Right now, as I fume about Lars Eller’s confidence potentially being eroded while he sits in the press box, my Internet feeds are alight with repeated calls for Martin’s head for splitting up the second line pairing of Scott Gomez and Brian Gionta.
This is precisely what a lot of armchair GMs such as yours truly have been calling for. Even the well-respected and high-profile Arpon Basu suggested pulling Gionta off Gomez’s wing in a recent blog entry. And last night Martin did just that, sliding Gionta onto the first line along with Tomas Plekanec and Michael Cammalleri.
If Martin were the sort of coach to shed his calm, cool demeanor long enough to scream and yell some sense at his players, I doubt very much that we’d see the sort of line experimentation that has been going on lately.
But the truth is this coach is not an excitable guy, and so to get his message across to his play ...
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Article written by Rosalyn Roy
Montreal Canadiens: In Defense of Head Coach Jacques Martin
November 7th, 2010 by Rosalyn Roy Leave a reply »
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