This is something you don’t see every day. While J.D. Drew may have had fans throw batteries at him, he never had a guy smash him on the head with a stick. And that’s exactly what happened in the KHL on Sunday. During a playoff game between Avtomobilist Ekaterinburg and Salavat Yulaev Ufa, Salavat Yulaev backup goalie Vitaly Kolesnik was attacked by a crazy fan.
Kolesnik wasn’t expecting to get into the game so he was helmet-less on the bench. That was bad news when an insane Automobilist fan rushed the glass and started hitting him with what was described as a stick. It’s unclear whether it was a hockey stick or some other kind of stick. But it doesn’t really matter since it did enough damage to leave Kolesnik bloodied and concussed. The backup netminder had to go to the hospital with injuries and said his head was hit “several times.”
RussianHockeyFans.com notes that the fan was drunk. Makes sense. In the video, he’s hauled off by security/police and I can only assume he was later killed. RussianHockeyFans.com also reports that Automobilist faces a 1 million ruble fine from the league. That’s a little over $34,000. Here’s the video:
one of these announcers definitely sounds like Al Trautwig's Russian equivalent