Devils managing director Todd Kelman talks exclusively to Dai-Sport’s Matthew Burgess about player recruitment, the Champions Hockey League and Jamie Elson.

The Cardiff Devils may have just seven of their roster officially signed on for next season, but managing director Todd Kelman does not look like a man in the grip of panic.

On the contrary, Kelman is relaxed about the shortage of players. Everything – he says, with a reassuring smile – is under control.

In fact, given the way the Devils have travelled down this road before, it’s easy to be convinced. Behind the scenes, they are busy finalising a team which they hope will secure the Elite league title for a third season in succession.

Before that, the team will compete in the Champions Hockey League (CHL) against some of the strongest teams on the continent.

Kelman says the Devils have further confirmed signings up their sleeves waiting to be officially announced and says their guarded approach to recruitment has been a successful formula for the team.

“I think in the first couple of years when we were quiet on the announcing front, our fans would think ‘what the heck are they doing, why are they taking so long?’” reflects Kelman ahead of his fifth season at the club.

“But the fans have to trust the fact that we know what we’re doing. Hopefully, they now understand that we have always got a plan, and we don’t like to show our cards too early in the game. We’ve had success by doing that, so that’s been our game plan.

“I think we probably have had more people contacting us that we would’ve before – just because we’ve won back-to-back titles,” adds Kelman before confirming the team are sitting on releasing news of further signings.

“We just like to keep things close to our chest and announce things in time. I can tell you we have more people signed, but we’re just keeping things quiet right now and will drip feed the information.

“We’ll drip-feed signings over the next few weeks and we’re in the process of building another team that we think can win the Elite League.”

Of the signings to have been confirmed by the Cardiff Devils so far, the return of goalie Ben Bowns is perhaps the most notable. The Team GB goaltender was in fine form at the World Championships in April leading the team to a gold medal, and it was speculated the Devils might struggle to retain the services of their popular goalie. But Kelman insists he was confident that Bowns would be returning to south Wales.

“Bownsy had already agreed to come back despite how good a World Championship he had.

“He probably did have offers but he’s happy here and settled here. He already said he was coming back and Bownsy is a pretty straight-up sort of guy, so I think it would’ve had to have taken a lot for him to leave after he had agreed to stay for us.”

Kelman, though, feels the team might have a tougher job in convincing Bowns to remain with the team beyond this season.

“It might be a different story next year and he might want to look around and see what’s available out there but we weren’t worried after he’d already given us his word.”

Despite renewing terms with Bowns, the Devils have lost another of their most influential players in recent years, following the confirmed departure of defenceman Andrew Hotham.

The departure of such an influential figure on and off the ice will undoubtedly hurt the Devils moving forward and Kelman says Hotham leaves an unfillable hole in the team which will require the whole defence to step up by committee and share the workload in his absence.

“It’s almost impossible to replace Andrew Hotham. Whatever defenceman we sign next people are going to be like, ‘that must be the replacement for Hotham’, but you don’t replace Hotham; what we need is to have every other defenceman score four more goals,” he explained.

“If there’s any positive about him not coming back, you can think that he was one of the better paid players, so we have some money to spend.
“We can build a supporting cast, but I really don’t think you can replace the guy. He was that good and that important to us, no matter what, you’d rather have him back than not have him but there’s nothing you can do about it.”

Throughout their history the Cardiff Devils have previous form when it comes to battling adversity – time and time again. With the rest of EIHL now plotting to knock the Devils from their perch domestically, the champions are also now trying to make their mark in Europe.

The Cardiff Devils will return to the Champions Hockey League in August where they are beginning to command respect from Europe’s elite club.

Kelman adds: “There’s a different level of respect this year. Obviously, there’s a level of respect for your opponent but when you are the lowest ranked team, teams are thrilled to get you in their draw.

“Now, though, because we upset Vaxjo and because we beat Davos last year, people were coming up to us from the Swedish teams saying, ‘Wow, I can’t believe you beat Davos last year, good for you’ and ‘Congratulations on the year you had,’ they knew all about it.

“I really pushed for Andrew Lord to do the CHL draw because I thought that’s another thing for us and kudos for our organisation – it’s a respect thing. Whether we like it or not out, our league is not as respected as the Swedish league of the German DEL League.

“It’s so much fun being part of the Champions Hockey League. Last year, until we got into the games and stuff all we were seeing was the costs. In your head, you’re just thinking ‘my god, this costs so much money.’

“It’s very different flying to Belfast than it is flying to Davos. The only hotel open in Davos in the summer is probably the most expensive one in town, the travelling was insane so on the business side of it you’re thinking ‘I don’t know if it’s worth being in the Champions Hockey League’ but the fans responded and bought the tickets. We more than covered our costs and that’s all we wanted to do.

“I can see why for some teams it’s expensive because if you’re a Finnish elite league team, you are having to play competitive games in late August and their summer is six-weeks long.
“For those six weeks, people want to get out and be outside and go to their cottages and don’t want to be indoors watching hockey. That’s a big challenge for the Champions Hockey League, selling tickets for those qualifying games.

“I think the UK had the highest average attendance in the CHL, between us and Nottingham. Obviously, Nottingham have a bigger crowd, but even on percentage of the building sold, I think we got 2,500 for the games which is great. But how does a team in Liberec sell a team coming from the UK Elite League, who they’ve never heard of, whereas for us, we’re playing a Czech Republic team and they’re one of the best teams in the world. So, we’re always playing against better competition and from their eyes, maybe they’re not,” he said.

He also explained the different financial factors between the top European clubs and those from the Elite league.

“From talking to these teams, you notice that because of their TV deals, ticket sales aren’t quite as important, so they’ll give away the CHL tickets for free as part of their season ticket package, whereas for us, we see it is an opportunity to play against better opponents and let our fans see some of the best teams in Europe.

“For us, I think it’s a great thing, but I’ve got to admit before we were in it, I talked to Sheffield, Nottingham and Braehead and I was like, ‘man, this sounds so expensive!’

“It can really crush your club if you don’t sell tickets and looking at the draw, all you’re thinking is ‘please get somewhere near a major airport’, but we love it now.
“We love going to the CHL draw, we love networking with all the other clubs. Other teams are saying we’ll see you next year as they’ve only got to finish in the top four to get in it, but for us to reach the CHL we’ve got to win the league!”

Kelman has steered a steady ship since taking on his role at the Cardiff Devils and it’s a club where continuity is valued. On that basis it came us a surprise to many of their fans when news broke that long-serving bench-coach Jamie Elson had left the club.

Speaking on the matter in depth for the first time, Kelman explained the decision was a difficult one which was influenced by Andrew Lord’s increased presence on the bench after hanging up his skates at the end of last season.

“It was literally just a budget issue,” revealed Kelman. “It wasn’t Jamie as a coach or a person or anything like that.

“I think there are players, fans and other people around the league that assume we have this enormous unlimited budget because we have this engaged, excited ownership group that love the team and are pretty vocal about it.

“But we’re not stupid with money, we want to be a profitable organisation and sustainable in Cardiff, so in reality when we moved Jamie from an office role into a coach role, we don’t have room for two coaches and someday Lordo is going to become a bench coach. We didn’t think it would come so quick, but the league became so much better so quickly, we had to make a decision.

“It sounds awful, but the money spend on a full-time coach is probably better spent on the ice. It is awful to be harsh like that and I know fans will be upset as they never want to see someone like that go because he’s been a big part of the club and a fan his whole life.

“Jamie is a really good guy and I wish him well. I’ve given him a lot of good references and I’ve called a couple of teams and places to try and keep him in a job in hockey, and I think he’ll get one.

“But if you look around the league, there’s not a lot of teams who have a full-time assistant coach.
“We made a move to improve the organisation when we moved Neil Francis away from coaching because we didn’t feel he could give Lordo the support as he wasn’t full-time and it was a budget constraint.

“Then we said we were going to move Jamie into a full-time role, but Andrew Lord is a full-time bench coach now and you can’t have two full-time bench coaches.”

By the time the Devils play their competitive fixture against Red Bull Salzburg on August 30, Kelman, Lord and all the Devils’ off-ice staff will have been frantically working away throughout the spring and summer months in order to get the club at an optimal level ready for the new campaign.

Between now and then you expect more tough decisions will be made or forced upon this team.

But with an established track record of success now in place, the Cardiff Devils are developing a knack of getting things right.