Europe
In Europe, junior teams are usually associated with a professional team, and are used by professional teams to develop their own talented youngsters. One example of this is the J20 SuperElit league in Sweden or the Minor Hockey League in Russia. Such leagues are sometimes dubbed major junior hockey leagues.
The lack of an amateur draft in Europe, other than in Russia, means that the onus is on the teams to sign the most talented youngsters they can get, and the presence of an affiliated junior team provides a place for young players who aren't yet ready for the rigours of the professional game to develop. However, not all players on a European junior team are necessarily the property of their professional club, and may elect to sign elsewhere.
Read more about this topic: Junior Ice Hockey
Famous quotes containing the word europe:
“Positively I sit here, and look at Europe sink, first one deck disappearing, then another, and the whole ship slowly plunging bow-down into the abyss; until the nightmare gets to be howling. The Roman Empire was a trifle to it.”
—Henry Brooks Adams (1838–1918)
“The heritage of the American Revolution is forgotten, and the American government, for better and for worse, has entered into the heritage of Europe as though it were its patrimony—unaware, alas, of the fact that Europe’s declining power was preceded and accompanied by political bankruptcy, the bankruptcy of the nation-state and its concept of sovereignty.”
—Hannah Arendt (1906–1975)
“Television is an excellent system when one has nothing to lose, as is the case with a nomadic and rootless country like the United States, but in Europe the affect of television is that of a bulldozer which reduces culture to the lowest possible denominator.”
—Marc Fumaroli (b. 1932)