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It has been 21 years since Thierry Paterlini (48) and Patrick Fischer (48), then HCD players, opened a sushi lounge together in Davos. These are no longer there, but you can still see them working together this week. Langnau coach Paterlini assists Fischer at the Swiss ice hockey games in Zurich.
While Fischer has been in the spotlight as national coach for eight years, Paterlini is now increasingly coming into the spotlight. Considering how far he has come with his staff during his year-and-a-half tenure with the SCL Tigers, the Zurich native still has a lot to accomplish in his coaching career.
Compliments don’t make him feel better
He receives compliments about the public perception of his work, but he does not really impress him: “I have seen and experienced too much for that. It doesn’t make me feel better when people think I’m the best. That was the case when I was still a player.”
Paterlini’s stellar playing career starts with a bang. When he was first called up to the national team at the age of 19, he was still playing for the NLB rankings. In 15 years he made 158 international appearances, nine World Championships and two Olympic appearances. He won two championship titles, one each with Bern (1997) and Davos (2002), and also played for the ZSC Lions, Lugano and the SCRJ Lakers. And at the very end two more seasons in Sierre before he retired at the age of 38. “The past two years were actually no longer necessary, but I needed them to emotionally detach myself from active sport. Because I really enjoyed being a player,” he reflects.
Bülach as “perfect start”
It was not on his radar for a long time that the coaching profession might appeal to him: “That only changed when he was thirty.” Then he started thinking more about what a coach can do particularly well, but also what he himself would do differently. During his long career he has gained a lot of inspiration. And put his conclusions in his own coaching backpack. “You have to be yourself to be authentic, but I also picked up ideas from other trainers. From a certain Ralph Krueger, for example, how he held the meetings and was always well prepared. Or from a certain Arno Del Curto, who always had a good relationship with the players.”
The Bassersdorfer earned his first spurs as a coach during two years at the third division EHC Bülach. “That was the perfect start,” he says. Paterlini already had one foot in the door of the association during this time and assisted with the U17 and also with the A-Nati during the short intermezzo of Fischer’s predecessor Glen Hanlon. He then became a full-time coach at the association and trained the U18 and U20 teams before the break came after five years due to different ideas.
The courage to take risks in Langnau
Looking back, Paterlini says, “I could have easily imagined staying, but it was also the perfect time to start something new.” The coaching job at HC La-Chaux-de-Fonds in the Swiss League is new: “This platform gave me the next boost, it was fantastic there.”
He will stay for two years, after which the National League will call the SCL Tigers. A mission with the appearance of an impossible mission, because the Emmentalers lost their performance culture during the Corona years without any risk of relegation. “Of course I had to think about it carefully. But it was also clear to me that if a National League club came knocking, it would not be ZSC or Zug, but a club where things were not going well at the moment,” says Paterlini. The first conversation in Langnau gave him a good feeling, “and I wanted to try myself at the highest level. I was willing to take the risk that things would go wrong and that I would be fired after three months.”
The comeback to the national team
Courage has been rewarded so far: Paterlini and Co. have sparked a remarkable spirit of optimism in Langnau. They are currently playing for their play-off chance and young talents are flocking to the Emmental because they see ideal conditions there for further development. Noah Meier and Brian Zanetti started, Joshua Fahrni and Dario Allenspach are next.
This week Paterlini is helping with the national team. Like Ambris Luca Cereda before him. Patrick Fischer and Nati director Lars Weibel asked him. «I was very happy with it and am happy to be there. The national team has always been a big part of my life and I have always enjoyed it,” says Paterlini. The dissonances that arose when he left as U20 national coach are no longer an issue for him. Because he continued to fill his coaching backpack with valuable experience.
Source : Blick
I’m Emma Jack, a news website author at 24 News Reporters. I have been in the industry for over five years and it has been an incredible journey so far. I specialize in sports reporting and am highly knowledgeable about the latest trends and developments in this field.
