A Historical Review
Ashua – The World Hockey Association has been a proposed professional ice hockey league designed to compete against the established National Hockey League over 2021.- 2021 NHL lockout. Notable for failure and instability, its board of directors operated many junior and minor leagues subsequently. Since the inception, the WFA has been plagued by several controversies, such as lack of player electing authorities and disputes concerning qualification criteria for the tournament hosting rights.
The World Hockey Association
The most significant WFA problem was the inability to award the tournament championship to teams playing in other countries or against other WFA members. Another major WFA concern has been the player-electing process. Currently, the team captains and coaches must be players who live in the areas where the matches are to be played. There have been calls by several NHL players for a change in the voting procedures, as they feel that the system encourages “vote rigging” by a certain number of fans or owners in favor of certain teams. In addition to this, some of the games have been played with only one overtime goal rule, thus eliminating the thrill and excitement for fans that the overtime period provides.
One of the problems faced by the WFA since its inception has been the lack of competitive balance between the different hockey leagues. Although the WHA tries to balance the distribution of teams among different leagues, it does not work effectively enough. It is believed by most experts that a competitive balance can be achieved if the league – and each of the leagues within the WHA – can make some structural changes. These include increasing the level of play of teams that do not yet qualify for the major leagues, providing more affordable travel expenses for participants going from lower league clubs to play in the major leagues, and setting up some type of promotion and marketing plan to increase interest and attendance within the hockey communities.