4 Nations Face-Off gives European players chance to speak native languages

MONTREAL -- Esa Lindell is from Finland but has been playing professional hockey in North America for a decade. When the defensemen walked into the Finland locker room at the 4 Nations Face-Off and all his teammates were speaking Finnish, well …

“It felt, like, a bit weird,” he said. “You’re used to English all the time.”

This is one of the interesting subplots behind the scenes as Canada, Finland, Sweden and the United States try to get the last word.

The tournament started in Montreal, a city of French and English, where you feel acutely how language ties to culture and identity.

Players from Sweden and Finland went back to speaking their native languages in the locker room. They also spoke their native tongues more than usual in media interviews, with more reporters from home here to cover the tournament.

It wasn’t as natural as you might think.

“I was a little worried at the start when you guys ask five questions in English, and then, all of a sudden, there’s a Finnish question,” Finland captain Aleksander Barkov told a group of reporters. “You have to think about not speaking English, so it takes a little time to adjust.”

But using their native languages helped bind the Finns and Swedes together, bring out their personalities and amplify their national pride. It also should serve as a reminder of what English-speaking North Americans take for granted.

“It’s nice, obviously,” Sweden forward Leo Carlsson said. “Obviously, I’m better in Swedish than English. Way more comfortable, obviously. Nice, because it’s been a while.”

English is the working language in hockey, because players come from so many places around the world and need a common standard.

That’s the case across North America, including Montreal. Traditionally, the Montreal Canadiens coach and some players speak in French and English to the media to communicate with fans, but they speak in English in the locker room to communicate with each other.

English can be the working language even in Europe.

“There’s so much North American players, so most of us coaches, we coach in English,” Sweden coach Sam Hallam said. “So, for me, it’s great to actually be able to coach in Swedish.”

When European players come to North America, they must adapt. Some speak English well already. Others learn on the fly to varying degrees.

If a team has a group of players from the same country, the players can communicate amongst themselves in their native language. The Florida Panthers have four players from Finland.

“It’s almost our secret language in the locker room sometimes,” said center Anton Lundell, who plays for Florida and Finland. “If we don’t want the other guys to understand us, we can say something in Finnish.”

Otherwise, everything is in English at the rink. Some European players end up speaking English at home too.

“My wife’s American, so it would be mostly American there,” Sweden forward Gustav Nyquist said. “She understands most [things in Swedish], but Swedish is a hard language to learn. The pronunciations are hard, so she tends to stay away from that. But she’ll understand if I’m saying something bad about her.”

When players represent Sweden and Finland at the IIHF World Championship, they speak their native languages. But those tournaments are in Europe after the NHL regular season each year. This tournament is in North America in the middle of the NHL regular season, making it unique.

Most players from Finland and Sweden know each other already. But speaking their native languages here gave them something in common immediately and helped them get to know each other better. It helped them express themselves better to each other and the media.

“I don’t think my personality comes out as clear in English as in Swedish, and that’s just normal,” Sweden center Mika Zibanejad said. “So, I think you kind of get to be yourself a little bit more in Swedish.”

Sweden and Finland are using national team coaches, not NHL coaches. The players had to remember the vocabulary.

“It’s different words you use, kind of, but we all understand,” Nyquist said. “It’s just different terminology, I guess, for the same thing, how coaches would explain it here. But it is nice to hear, actually.”

When a reporter asked if players could use their native language to their advantage on the ice, giving each other instructions that players from another country couldn’t understand, Hallam started to answer the question in Swedish. That drew laughter. Everyone got the joke, even if they didn’t speak the language.

Hallam said he thought the players would do the opposite, actually.

“They’re going to scream and yell to each other in English,” Hallam said. “‘Over! Over!’ ‘Here! Here!’ ‘Open! Open!’ ‘Stretch!’ Whatever. Just because that’s what they’re doing in games over here, and many of them have been here since they were nearly kids, about 18, 19 years old, so I think it’s about to be a lot of English from our group, too, because it just comes natural.”