A shaky throne
Frankly speaking, it's very probable that the Austrian jumpers will win the Nation's Cup of the of the overall ski jumping World Cup for the ninth time in a row. The team around Gregor Schlierenzauer, Thomas Morgenstern, Andi Kofler and Martin Koch is extremely strong again this winter. But, that's already obvious after the first three weekends this season, for the first time in eight years they are not in a league of their own.
And honestly, everyone was waiting for this to happen, even the Austrians themselves. It has been too long that there were real duels on a level playing field at the 4-Hills-Tournament. For too long the Austrians could, and at the end they had to, smile pityingly at the Germans and pay them compliments for respectable success from time to time. It was never meant to be mean, the difference in the level of performances was just too big.
The fact that the German ski jumping team leads in the overall ranking after three of 22 stops of the World Cup winter shows their strong performance. With 1450 points (2nd Austria 1289, 3rd Norway 1123, 4th Japan 669) - Nation's Cup standing » - the team of head coach Werner Schuster leads in the Nation's Cup. Even if it has to be considered that the Austrians couldn't score points in the team competition in Lillehammer due to a disqualification.
New depth in the team
This situation is the result of very dynamic performance of the German team around Severin Freund, Richard Freitag and youngster Andreas Wellinger. Naming only these three is a mistake when looking for the reasons: not to forget are Andreas Wank, Michael Neumayer, young Karl Geiger and Danny Queck. The strength of the team is its enormous depth.
"At the beginning I achieved the good results, but when I'm not among the best, other of our team are. That's what makes us so extremely strong as a team", World Cup leader Severin Freund said after his fifth place in the second competition in Sochi. That was exactly what made the Austrian team of head coach Alex Pointner so outstanding when it comes to success in ski jumping.
Schuster: "Reduce the gap to Austria"
"Reducing the gap to Austria, place second in the Nation's Cup and secure this spot", that was the goal of German head coach Werner Schuster before the start of the season. This goal remains realistic, the winter is still long. The fact that there's the chance of a duel on a level playing field with Austria makes the anticipation for the rest of the winter season grow.
The 61st 4-Hills-Tournament will be the first since many years that carries the name "German-Austrian 4-Hills-Tournament" not only because it takes place in these two countries but because it truly deserves it. Even if the winner can also come from Norway, Switzerland, Japan, Poland, Slovenia or Russia.