Criticism starting to affect the productivity of Tomas Kaberle (Part 1)
There were high expectations that Tomas Kaberle brought with himself when he moved from Maple Leafs to Boston Bruins this February.
Many considered him to be the missing piece in Bruins’ hunt for championship glory but this hasn’t been the case so far. He was expected to lead Bruins from the front in defence that would be brick wall solid and added a few goals up front to show his worth.
Unfortunately, for the player and the team, both have been disappointed so far as Kaberle hasn’t been able to come up with the expected performances.
When the playoffs kicked off, he was expected to shine after a rough regular season, but once again, he was unable to use the abilities to the fullest and hasn’t been able to shine as yet.
He was facing high criticism ever since the first game that he played in the Stanley Cup playoffs.
However, the intensity of the criticism along with Kaberle underperforming consistently is starting to affect him now.
This is what Bruins’ coach, Claude Julien, accepted saying that the negative criticism is starting to deteriorate Kaberle’s game further.
The saviour title that was once given to him at the start of his journey with Bruins seems to have been taken back from him.
However, Julien is still hoping that like all other players, he is going through tough times in his career, but he still has immense potential in him.
There will be high responsibility with pressure playing the greater part as Bruins take on Lightning in the second game of the Eastern Conference Finals at the TD Garden in Boston.
Bruins is already trailing Lightning by 1-0 in the series and with the need to win the game, it remains to be seen as to how Bruins and Kaberle, in particular, respond to this call.
"I think there's no doubt people have looked at him as a saviour because their power play had been struggling", Julien said after Monday's practice, which featured a significant amount of work on the man-advantage units. "He's just a piece of the puzzle.
And it's unfortunate, but there's the other guys on the power play had the responsibility to do the job, as well".
The entire blame for the team’s poor performance can by no means be levied on Kaberle but considering the level of expectations from him, he has not met them by far and this is at last one of the reasons that has hurt Bruins.
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