Canadiens: Demidov Update

While Russia is currently excluded from international tournaments for reasons we know all too well, there is still one competition with international flavour the country can compete in. Each year, the Channel One Cup is held over there and mainly features countries that were part of the Soviet Union in the past.

This year's event is currently underway and includes four teams: Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan and a KHL all star team. For the first time of his young career, Ivan Demidov has been picked for the senior national team. The Montreal Canadiens' prospect has told RG.org in an interview that he sees this as an opportunity to spend times with the guys and stay in shape.

Just like in KHL play, Roman Rotenburg is his coach for the tournament and there are 17 players from his SKA St. Petersburg team on the roster out of a total of 33 players for the Russian national side. The Russians played their first game today, and, unsurprisingly, Demidov was not dressed.

Still, the news are not all bad, in the above-mentioned interview, the now 19-year-old right winger told Daria Tuboltseva that he has been in regular contact with the Canadiens organization. As we reported last month, members of the organization went to visit Demidov at the end of October, turns out Jeff Gorton and Nick Bobrov were the ones who made the trip and the SKA player appreciates the contact with the association and the interest they pay in his growth. It now make a lot of sense that Gorton spoke about the Russian prospect in his Amazon Prime interview.

Related: Canadiens: No Easy Way Out For Demidov

The interview also reveals member of the Canadiens' development team communicate regularly with Demidov after he plays games, not after every game but still regularly "maybe once a week or two".

It's great to know that while Demidov isn't exactly getting as much ice-time as one would like, the Canadiens are still watching him closely and providing feedback on how he could improve his game. It's not as good as getting plenty of ice time, but it sure is better than starting from square one when he does cross the pond to come over to North America.

Interestingly, we also learn in the article that Demidov is still relatively anonymous in Russia, he doesn't get recognized on the street, much like former NHLer Evgeny Kuznetsov apparently. Hopefully, he's making the most of his time outside of media scrutiny because once he's in Montreal, both media and fans will be keeping tabs on him.

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